• • ■ POEMS OF • • t, 
HUMAN PROGRESS 




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POEMS OF HUMAN 
PROGRESS 



AND OTHER PIECES : INCLUDING ONE HUNDRED 
AND FIFTEEN SONNETS 



JAMES HARCOURT WEST 

AUTHOR OP ' UPLIFTS OF HEART AND WILL," " THE COMPLETE LIFE, 
"in love WITH LOVE," " THE NINTH PARADISE," ETC. 



aeSttfj JFotir EUustrattong 




BOSTON 

THE TUFTS COLLEGE PRESS 

PUBLISHERS 






Copyright, 1914 
By James H. West 



Mim'di^ 



©CI,A374177 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Proem : Revolve, O Earth I i 

The Spirit of Song 2 

POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Man's Triumph-Era {^Phi Beta Kappa poem) 3 

The Epic of Man 27 

Miscellaneous 

Accelerant -ly 

To a Baby of the Tv^rentieth Century 38 

Alpha and Omega ^o 

Up to the Heights 41 

What Are We Here For ? 42 

The Great .■> 

No More ^5 

The Wail of Low Humanity 47 

Justice ! Freedom ! 48 

Courage, O Workers ! 40 

Good Shall Conquer, Never Fear ci 

Sonnets 

The Dayspring e^ 

Reciprocation ca 

The New Creators 1-4 

Dream-Prophecy cc 

Lowell c5 

In Admiration of World-Helpers c6 

Children's Children 1-7 

Detritus, I., II., III., IV 58-60 

Meditation After the Passing of Ernest Crosby 60 

O Story-Teller ! Poet ! 61 

Residuum, I., II 62-63 

Entombed 5, 

To Yield 64 

V 



vi CONTENTS 

POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 
Miscellaneous page 

Earth's Golden Prime Lies Infinitely On 65 

" Signs and Wonders " 66 

To Truth — My God 69 

" Prepared " 70 

Deeper and Higher 71 

God and Man -72 

Man's Best Word God's True Word 73 

The Liberty Wherewith We Are Made Free 74 

The Age of Good 75 

In the Name of God 76 

Star and Cross 76 

The New Evangel 77 

Uplifts of Heart and Will 78 

Transformation 79 

In Secret 80 

Whence the Glory ? 80 

" Laborers Together " 82 

Sonnets 

Search 83 

Loftier Good 84 

Worship 84 

Revelation 85 

"Of One" 86 

The Mother 86 

Beacon-Lights 87 

Religion as a Life 88 

" I Will Lay Mine Hand Upon My Mouth " 89 

Recognition of Oneness 90 

Wings 91 

" To Thine Own Self Be True " 92 

POEMS OF LIVING 
Miscellaneous 

Man's Opportunity 93 

Ungrasped 95 

Thyself Within 96 



CONTENTS vii 

POEMS OF LIVING 
Miscellaneous [continued) page 

The Path of Sun 97 

Life's Meaning 98 



Futures 

Coin in Any Realm 

Soul's Paradise 

Forever On 

" In Thy Youth " 

Soul and Sense 

Life's Beauty 

Work 

Confessions of a Voluptuary 

The Laughing Philosopher 

Inward Fires 

Sage and Clown 

Three Quatrains : Self-Illumined 

Words and Deeds 

The Devil of Drink 

Dream-Counsel 

Cypress-Crowned 

Forelooking 

Zeal 

Through the Sunset Sea 

After a Week with a Woodchopper 

At the Summit - 

Sonnets 

To Prize Life's Hardness 

How Sing'st Thou, Then ? 

Joy in One's Work 

The Man on the Mountain 

Hours of Insight 

My Feathered Preacher 

Ideal Beauty 

The Path, I., II 134- 

The Victor 

Spirals 

Heart's Treasures 



viii CONTENTS 

POEMS OF LIVING 

Sonnets {continued) page 

And Last of All I Learn It 137 

Foils, I., II 13S-139 

Platitudes 139 

Noon in the Printing-Shop 140 

True Life of Us 140 

The Nameless Record 141 

A Radiant Youth I Knew, I., II 142-143 

Self-Made Crosses 143 

Causation ■ 144 

Heredity 144 

Self-Gratulation 145 

Across the Line : At Fifty 146 

Ultima Thule 147 

The Loveliest Angel 148 

POEMS OF NATURE 

Miscellaneous 

In Treetop Land 149 

" A Breath from the Fields " 150 

Daffodils , 152 

Sonata of the Dragon-Fly 153 

Body and Spirit 155 

Mystic River 157 

Sunshine 160 

Pan , 163 

Sonnets 

One with All 165 

In Suburban Woods 166 

Sunrise in Codman Park 166 

In Vacation 167 

By Dark or Light 168 

Enchanted Ground 168 

So Like the Spring She Stands 169 

The Earth at Play 170 

Hills of Morning 170 

Comrades 171 



CONTENTS ix 

POEMS OF NATURE 

Sonnets {continued) p^^^ 

To My Old Wheel 172 

On Crossing the Charles at Its Mouth 172 

A Spray of Hemlock .... 17^ 

Gull and Wave 174 

Exemplar 174 

On Cape Ann I7e 

Dear Mother Earth 176 

Two Wisps of Straw 176 

Nature's Foundlings 177 

The Secret 178 

Spirit with Spirit 179 

The Pendulum . . . ' 180 

Sonnets of the Blue Hills Reservation 

Indian Summer 181 

In the Blue Hills in November, I., II 182-183 

On Hancock Hill 183 

In Wildcat Notch 184 

In Wonder Every Hour . 184 

Winter Glory 185 

On Board Ship in Sassamon Notch 186 

Gain Still the Goal 186 

Vine and Birches 187 

"The Shanty" 188 

The Silver Birch 189 

The Pine-Tree igo 

To a Hemlock on Chickatawbut 191 

December Hilltops 192 

POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 
Miscellaneous 

The Transcendent Possibility 193 

The Kiss of Death 194 

The Loved and Gone 19c 

Who Knows ? 196 

The Passing 199 

Gone 201 



X CONTENTS 

POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE {coniinued) 

Sonnets page 

At the Turn of the Road 203 

By the Dark-Bright River 204 

Eastward Windows 204 

Known of Old 205 

The Vanished 206 

ADDITIONAL POEMS 

The Bells of Como 207 

Heart of Youth 227 

Miscellaneous 

Day Unto Day 235 

When Young Hearts Love 237 

I Feel That I Know Her 238 

Sweetest Songs Are Never Sung 240 

The Schoolmaster's Dream - 242 

Old Timothy John 245 

Midas and Musagetes 249 

Moonlight on College Hill 251 

College Hill 254 

Sonnets 

In a Country Burial-Ground 256 

Love's Predicament 257 

Penalty 258 

To the Muse, After Silence 258 

" Good-Bye " 259 

Rebirth 260 

Times and Seasons 

For a Birthday 261 

Merry Christmas 262 

" Then Felt I Like Some Watcher of the Skies " . . . . 262 

Bon Voyage 264 

Death of My Friend : the Old Year 265 

Easter 266 



CONTENTS xi 

ADDITIONAL POEMS (continued) 

Occasional and Personal p^gk 

In Grateful Love 267 

To My Children on Their Marriage Day 268 

" Look Back at Times " 269 

Out of the Distance 271 

Up Higher 272 

" Seventy " 274 

Sonnets 

Mother and Child 276 

To James Vila Blake 277 

In Quest to Know 278 

At Spruce-Tree 279 

God's Mariners, I., II 280-281 

The Loyal Traitor 282 

Redeem Yourself, O Land ! 282 

Five Times 283 

Finished 284 

In Memoriam 

The Dead Student 285 

Lewis G. Janes 288 

Adoniram Judson Patterson 290 

Earlier Pieces 

Concord River 291 

Whither, Ye Stately Ships 295 

The Sorrowing Wind 297 

A Cane from Gethsemane 298 

The Violet 301 

All as One 304 



L'Envoi : Meteors 



305 



Index of Titles 307 

Index of Sonnets 312 

General Index . . .• 314-328 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



" Fragrance of clover, coolness in the deeps 
Beneath low branches where the long grass creeps, 
And most of all, the high horizon's rim. 
Where cloudy summits, swathed in beauty, swim." 

— Frontispiece 

" How blest are they whose feet these slopes ascend. 
Where Thought and Brotherhood together blend ! " 

— Facing page 4 

" ' Come out and visit us ! ' the Blue Hills call : 

' From Rattle Rock or Chickatawbut scaled 

See leagues of undulating glory spread ! ' " 

^ Facing page iSi 

" Full many a placid hour 

Beside your edge I 've strayed. 
And many a sylvan bower 
Has Fancy there displayed." 

— Facing page 2g2 



XU 



PROEM 



PROEM 

Revolve, O Earth ! You cannot zvJiirl 
And in yonr pat/nvay not tinfiirl 
Rare canvases of sky and sea 
And glowing faces, greeting me. 

Yon too revolve, my circling rhyme ! 
Not yours the art defying Time, 
Yet canvases of love you show. 
Where troubled hearts for rest may go. 

Flow on, thou Ocean at my door ! 

Not here alone your billows roar. 

But 'mid the ice of Arctic seas 

And round the shilling Cyc lades. 

Flozv too, my verse, in mobile tide / 
On Being 's billoivs rise and ride. 
Not yours to thiuider round the Poles, 
But haply you may freshen souls. 

In beauty bloom, O tasseled Corn 
And Wheat lands that the West adorn 1 
The sunlight ' s kisses crown your head 
And you supply the zvorld with bread. 

O souTs high uplaiids zvJiere I plant ! 

Life's simples are your Jiarvest scant. 

Happy if seekers in your hills 

Find herbs for healing human ills. 



THE SPIRIT OF SONG 

Raptiwed by the Springtime Muse, 
Do the robins " will " to sing ? 

Do the meadow-sparrows "choose" 
When their liquid notes shall ring '. 

Nay, the lilt is in their heart, 

And the strains nnbidden start. 

Song, tJiou sonl's divine estate. 
Hold me ever at thy call ! 

Left ijt silence, glad I wait ; 
Used, I render thee my all. 

Humble is my homely lyre — 

Thou the spirit, thou t lie fire. 



POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 



Read at Tufts College, June i8, 1906, at the meeting 

of the Delta Chapter of Massachusetts, 

Phi Beta Kappa 



[The poem depicts a walk with college men, with discourse on 
human progress] 



• Philosophy ( Wisdom ) the guide of life ' 



POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

/. MAN'S TRIUMPH- ERA 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 
I 

Hail, scenes and faces of my youth's delight ! 
And you no less, friends newer to my sight ; 
For all are one, in heart and wish and will. 
Who ever came in faith to College Hill. 

How blest are they whose feet these slopes ascend, 
Where Thought and Brotherhood together blend ! 
Where Knowledge lures the mind to highest reach, 
While Friendship binds the seekers each to each. 
Knowledge alone is but an Arctic dame ; 
She needs the ardor of Affection's flame, 
The fertile warmth which nurtures scope and plan. 
Ere she shall minister her wealth to man. 
Put well your knowledge to some frequent use, — 
The Alpine blossom yields its saving juice ; 
Cherish your brothers in the daily stress, — 
The calculus uncovers a caress. 

'T was thus I dreamed in years when life was young ; 
For this no less to-day I find a tongue. 
Required to sing on Learning's sacred ground. 
What higher strain could loyal minstrel sound ! 

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II 

I thank you, brothers, for this honor given ! 
Had I, ambitious, for distinction striven, 
A higher honor I had scarcely sought 
Than this which freely to my hand you brought. 
It is not now as in the days of old, 
When godlike Homer wove his cloth of gold, 
Or Pindar, for admiring throngs around. 
Made Nature vocal with alluring sound. 
The warrior and the senator found then 
Their rest and recreation in the pen, 
And highest honors of the hall and State 
Were his who had the genius to create. 

Swayed by the magic muse of Sophocles, 
Men hailed him messenger of Heaven's decrees. 
The ardor of a mind-exultant day 
Awoke in him a soul-exalting lay. 
In which, forever. Justice found a tongue. 
And gods from men their evil impulse wrung. 
No joy or rage he sang with tuneful art 
But found an echo in the human heart. 

Let ^schylus but offer to recite, 
A crowd hung breathless till the shades of night. 
O time-long tragedy ! — the life of good, 
Which vainly struggled to be understood. 
Yet, baffled by the ignorance of man. 
So often held him under cruel ban ! 
But eager multitudes enraptured heard. 
And felt forgiven as by some Heavenly Word. 



6 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Simonides but raised his voice to sing, 
A score had laurels in their hands to fling, 
And all his audience arose as one 
To thunder plaudits when his verse was done. 
Happy the poet bringing rhymes to-day 
Whose hearers do not rise — to run away ! 

Ill 
Yet not to Poesy — to man's own heart 
The doom, if earnestness from earth depart ! 
For Song is Earnestness ! is Vital Force ! 
Its lightning flashes from the Primal Source ; 
And robed in phrase of beauty, sweet and high. 
It lifts man's spirit to its native sky. 
It dies when pettiness or thirst for power 
Usurps inglorious the spirit's dower ; 
Life's outward luxury — divine as means — 
Is sordid end, and to decadence leans. 
Time was. New England gloried in her choir 
Of poet-prophets of divinest fire ; 
America again shall burst to song 
When she again exalts the right o'er wrong. 
The permanent o'er transient, — golden joys 
Of lasting greatness o'er its poor alloys. 
No greatness gleams where verse in thought is bound 
And bards content themselves with form and sound. 

The singers who have held the world in awe 
Chose mighty themes ! They sought the secret law 
Which binds men to the highest, and their strife 
Revealed the oneness of that law with Life. 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 7 

The singers of the early Attic hne 
Struck oft a chord less human than divine. 
The drama of man's tragic earthly fate, 
The love of love, an awful hate of hate, 
A yearning death's dark mystery to scan, 
The overbrooding of the gods with man. 
Life's deep despair, hope's strife magnanimous. 
The vulture and the chains on Caucasus, — 
Love ever dragging stones up slippery hills, 
Yet good triumphant at the last o'er ills, — 
The groping soul in labyrinth of doubt. 
Yet faithful to the clue which leads it out, — 
Thus sang and strove the giant poets then, 
And justified the ways of God to men. 
To-day no more we lift that heathen rod. 
But justify the ways of men to God ! 

IV 

The seer alone shall sing ! his word has worth 
In measure as it rarefies the earth. 
O Dante, Milton, Wordsworth, Tennyson ! 
By right divine your deathless fame ye won ! 
O Lowell, Whitman, Emerson ! your brows 
Were lofty with the truth ye did espouse ! 
Freedom and justice — brotherhood — your call ; 
No thought of self was yours, but thought of all ; 
And endless as the ages is their fame 
Who dare for truth the world's repulse and shame. 

This is the touch, the test the Muses bring 
To venturing spirit who aspires to sing : — 



8 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

What bliss wilt thou forego, what danger dare, 
What nakedness and ignominy share 
To give thee insight, wisdom, make thee ripe 
To blow upon Apollo's tuneful pipe ? 
That soul alone who shareth mortal woe 
Triumphant up Parnassus' heights shall go ; 
That spirit only which hath felt the fire 
Can fan a flame to make the world aspire. 



No less our rare To-day than epochs gone 
May sound the poet's call, " Come up and on ! " 
The world from gloom of a material age 
Is sweeping to a sunlit heritage. 
O humble who would strike immortal lyre, 
Ascend Prometheus-like and seize your fire ! 

There is a spirit in the air to-day 
Which cries, " Return ! Resume the righteous way ! 
The broader universe which now men know 
Seemed bent at first men's faith to overthrow. 
With faith and fear went consciousness of right, 
But they have found false freedom but a blight. 
Though sundered from the dogmas of the past. 
They find the soul's high dignity holds fast. 
They learn that liberty is not despite, — 
That freedom is but freedom in the right. 
Again they know that good has power to bless ; 
Integrity is still the one success. 

The mighty problem which confronts men now 
Is Knowledge with devotion to endow. 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 9 

High work has science ; this is harder, higher : — 

New insight with old reverence to inspire ! 

The creeds of ignorance can ne'er return ; 

Their imaged woes in their own torment burn ; 

But the high temper of their authors' souls 

Must color and inflame our finer goals. 

A lofty lie may lofty fruitage bear 

If lofty spirits give it sun and air ; 

But truth itself shall fail of saving might 

If halting followers neglect its light. 

One sacred highway opens for man's feet : 
The path of Truth : through flowers — through dust 

and heat. 
One deathless passion sanctifies his heart : 
To do the Right, and never from it part. 

VI 

The Truth ? — the Right ? — are these so hard 
to find ? 
Are men so godlike, yet forever blind ? 

A scholar sought to know where truth might He, 
That he might follow it ere called to die. 
Through all the weary wilderness of books 
He wandered, as a child by running brooks. 
No ancient shrines or monuments he missed. 
Nor peaks Himalayan, all sunrise-kissed, 
Where Meditation dreamed and mystics dwelt. 
Whatever China taught or Egypt felt 
He made his own ; and Babylon and Greece 
Lent sculptured fantasy and golden fleece. 



lo POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Through all the French philosophers he sought, 
With German metaphysics patient wrought ; 
And Spencer, Darwin, Dolbear, Royce, and James 
In his long studies were familiar names. 

One summer twilight, still he delved and dreamed, 
Though far as ever from the truth he seemed ; 
And while, through open door, came insects' hum. 
He wrote this sonnet of the Pendulum : — 

The Pendulum 

Nature, in thy glad temple, to and fro. 
Ever the pendulum of beauty swings ; 
Summer or winter, spring or autumn, brings 
Rapture of eye where'er we turn or go. 

Dawn-dew, the virtue of the sunrise-glow, 

The grasses' strength, the spruces' freshening rings, 
Fall's smokeless flame, white wreaths December 

flings, — 
Largess of beauty gods might joy to know. 

Surely, O Nature, thine no mocking bloom ! 
Vibrates thy pendulum not aimlessly, — 
An order meaningless, — a dial-less clock ! 

Yet where revolve thy hands that point our doom ? 
And how through ages is rewound thy key .'* 
No answer greets us though we knock and knock. 



Before him open on the table lay 
In Greek the volume wherein day by day 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA ii 

He pondering read of one whose soul was set 
To raise the world above consuming fret ; 
A soul that found in lilies of the field 
A promise of the beauty life should yield 
To every seeker who with simple heart 
Embraced the good and bade the ill depart. 
The Greek he loved, and in it daily read ; 
It seemed a living language, not a dead. 
And yet its meaning did not live for him ; 
It oft seemed desultory, vague, and dim. 
He did not dig into its heart to find 
The secret hidden there, but read as blind. 
So read he now, perceiving not its grace, 
Nor knowing that it wore a seraph's face. 
" What meaning," cried he, " can this mystery bear .-* " 
Then scanned again the wonder written there : 

" Tt ^rjrelre rov ^oivra /xera ro)v veKpoiv ; " 

" 'T is of a piece," he said, " with all my search 
Through dim philosophy and dimmer Church, 
Through science, dogmas, ancient pagan lore. 
Old Eastern dream and Western logic's store ; — 
It all resolves itself at last to haze. 
And leaves the seeker wandering in a maze." 

Poor foolish scholar ! asking still the same 
Old foolish questions without end or aim ! 
Happy, the drawing night approached in calm. 
And wrapped the earth and him in slumber's balm. 



12 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

While now in dreams he wandered, worn with 
thought, 
A sudden glow descended, and he caught 
A vision of a bright angelic form. 
As mellow as the sunlight after storm. 
The apparition smiled, — serene his look, — 
And laid his angel finger on the book ; 
Then scanned with love the scholar and the page, 
And read aloud the dream of Syrian age, — 
The very words at which the scholar stopped 
Ere wearily in sleep his head he dropped : 

" Ti ^-qrelre rov ^wvra jxera tmv veKpoiv ; " 

" Your search," the Angel said, " has here its end ! 
This heavenly trope becomes your guide and friend ! 
Upon this vine hang grapes in rich excess 
Which each new age for wine of life must press. 
The letter killeth," said the Angel bright ; 
"The spirit giveth unimagined light. 
Forget the time and scene that spake the word, 
As ye neglect the plumage of a bird 
When song ecstatic ripples on the air, 
Its melody a medicine for care. 
Ye strive for truth in dreams of ages fled : 
* Wky seek ye for the living 'mid the dead ! ' 
What if the secret in that phrase should be — 
Seek not for truth in old futility ! 
' Seek not the living where repose the dead ' — 
Seek not in crypts and catacombs for bread. 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 13 

Seek not the dawn in darkened sunset sky, 

Seek not for flame where only ashes he. 

The hving dwell not where the dead repose : 

Only the beetle to such feasting goes. 

Rest not thine eye on graves, but rather scan 

Some living world where waits some living man. 

Grind not forever the Past's mouldy bones ; 

The Present offers hot electric stones 

From out whose contact — if his aid man lend — 

Burst rays of energy earth's woes to end. 

Not by the starry reckonings of the Past 

The course of current destiny is cast. 

No act or thought of yesterday can say 

To present need, ' I am the truth, the way.' 

Each sun that rises draws its heavenly rill. 

And adds to human insight, wish, and will. 

The truth comes nearest in each latest deed 

Where earth is helped, or they are raised who bleed." 

When morning, robed in iridescent light. 
Made hill and tree a rapture to the sight. 
The scholar rose and looked upon the earth. 
His soul exuberant with holy mirth. 
The blossom he had sought so far away 
He found a-bloom in his own heart that day : — 

In the Present's need and beauty 
Find the Present's truth and good ; 

Only in its present duty 

Shall the Now be understood. 



14 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

VII 

How beautiful is youth which sets its heart 
To know earth's needs — and takes the righteous part ! 
O you once young with me ! — and ever young ! — 
How sweet those vanished seasons when we flung 
Our flag of eager search to truth's free sky, 
And vowed its ministry to magnify ! 
These slopes to which fond memory oft returns 
Were then our Horeb ! — (Moses' bush still burns !) — 
And all the wide horizon round about 
Was Holy Ground, and we its priests devout. 
How oft, in dear dead days no more to be, 
Yon hills and waters lured us forth in glee 
To seek enchantment such as sailors find 
When up the streams of some new world they wind ! 
Columbus nor Vespucci ever knew 
More marvels than before our footsteps grew : 
Lakes, pathless forest-ways, the rocky dome 
Of crumbling hills where blue-bells had their home. 
And pines and hemlocks which in shady grove 
Implored us, " Rest, belov'd ! no longer rove ! " 
Boughs which, when we departed, gave us bloom 
Freely to decorate our evening room ; — 
Nor ever ours Macbeth's despairing thrill 
When Stoneham woods should come to College Hill, 
But rather, rare delight that in our arm 
We bore the leaves for every earthly harm. 

Yet ne'er we journeyed on that frequent walk 
Simply to wander. Nay, we went to talk. 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 15 

Nor yet alone to talk, but also think, 

Determined not Thought's utmost isle to shrink. 

O mind of youth, how large thy thoughts and wide ! 

What though Tradition may thy dreams deride, 

Let no professor think he shall confine 

In four-walled class-room search for the divine ! 

Not in books only of the mouldering Past — 

In living souls the melodies that last ! 

So forth we wandered — youths on errands bent : 

The " Father's business " which is never spent. 

" Come, Frank ! come, Rufus ! let us walk to-day ! " 
That call, who heard and ever answered " Nay " ? 

I pause and ponder. Fain my eyes would look 
Again upon each face as on a book. 
Once more I mingle with that eager band ! — 
In thought I greet them, — take each friendly hand. 

O magic art that summons vanished joys. 
Through thee I hail again the old-time boys ! 

VIII 

The Old -Time Boys 

O brothers, give a moment's dream 

To sacred seasons gone ; 
Again catch evanescent gleam 

Of Joe and Will and John. 

How many are the years between. 
With hopes that rose and sank ! 



i6 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

But naught can our affection wean 
From Ez and Rob and Frank. 

Brave comrades ! some have tamed the air, 
Some spanned the mountain gorge ; 

We love to see the natives stare 
At deeds of Sam and George. 

Tread softly ! some are lying low 

Within their grassy bed ; 
All dewy are the flowers we throw 

To slumbering Dick and Ned. 

A thousand still earth's bubbles chase 

As years successive fall ; 
The prizes — are they worth the race 

To Steve and Gus and Paul ? 

A score are wise professors now 
Who once seemed dull as we ! 

We doff our hats to Tom, and bow, — 
He 's now a Ph.D. 

A host, with tireless pen and brain, 
Have wrought for truth and man. 

'T is well ! — for us they still remain 
Just Eb and Rube and Dan. 

To grow so great, upon what meat 
Hath this our Caesar fed ! 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 17 

Of old, who dreamed such lofty seat 
Would be attained by Fred ? ' 

A modest glow may likewise thrill 
Your bard of transient fame ; — 

Upreared upon this honored Hill 
One Hall embalms his name ! ^ 

But, comrades, mainly 'tis the strength, 

The loyal works and lives. 
Of silent sons, by which at length 

A fostering mother thrives. 

Be sure, O who in quiet ways 

Still honor Tufts by deeds. 
That youths as endless as the days 

Shall still supply her needs. 

Still fresh, on Oval and in halls, 

As time its passage treads, 
Shall rise, when Alma Mater calls, 

Her answering Johns and Eds. 

IX 

But, brothers, now, in thought of other years, 
On one glad walk to-day be my compeers ! 

Those rovings of our youth-time come not back ; — 
Nor, came they, could we take the selfsame track ! 

'At that time the President of Tufts College. == West Hall! 



i8 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

The cherished groves which lured our youthful feet, 
The scenes where soul found contemplation sweet, 
Have vanished ; and through hillside, field, and fen 
Wind busy highways now, for busy men. 

With changing generations and new days 
Change also paths where men's ambition strays. 
The waking world learns riches cannot take 
The place of honor, nor its loss remake. 
Our boasted age its "golden standard" had. 
But holds its standard now but money-mad. 
If one had genius, that was very well — 
If it enabled him to buy and sell. 
Worth still the man did make, and crowned the 

earth ; — 
But it must be a million dollars' worth. 
The wind blows east, and then the wind blows west ; 
The wind of virtue speeds man's shallop best. 

Come, Tom ! come, Harry ! walk a mile with me ! — 
The earth has gold no sordid eye can see : 
It lies beside the common road — the way 
Where buttercups flash open to the day 
And lily-lips reach up to drink the sky 
And daisy-fields in wind-swept furrows lie. 
It dwells in simple thought and simple heart. 
Forsaking care to find the better part. 
Why mumble dust before one's time, I say ! 
The dust will come full soon, and come to stay. 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 19 

The twilight falls ! the whip-poor-will 

His note is calling; 
And all the air — no moment still — 
Is vibrant with the pulsing thrill 
Of crickets, spelling field and hill 

With sound incessant, rising, falling, — 
Fit chorus for the whip-poor-will, 

Still calling, calling. 

O you who in these classic hives 

Find soul-exalting toil. 
Remember those whose dusty lives 

Are mured in thankless moil. 

Pierian spring for you ne'er fails ! — • 

Their dream no culture decks 
Whose only knowledge comes in bales, 

Whose lore is drafts and checks. 

No time is theirs the clouds to scan 

Or hear the robin calling ; 
They 've only time for sifting bran , 

And keeping stocks from falling. 

On nights so still that field and tree. 

And even breezes, listen. 
Oh, who will walk a mile with me 

To watch Orion glisten ? 

Forever must we ape the bee ? 
Forever seek but honey ? 



20 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Oh, who will walk a mile with me 
To lose a little money ! 

X 

With thought of earth as more than golden ball, • 
Come dreams of sharing planet-wealth with all. 

The race — for ages blind with mental lack, 
And bent with woes of brutehood on its back — 
At length uplifted eyes to greet the stars, 
Spurned its low levels, burst all hindering bars. 
Stood upright, knew itself at last as Man, 
With godlike powers to hew and build and plan. 

When once he spoke, the victory was nigh ; 
Speech was his ladder leaning on the sky. 
Each now could work with others ; each could tell 
The thought, the dream, which lured him to excel. 
O magic word, " Together ! " — this the charm 
To speed the race beyond the power of harm ! 

Yet man still clung, still clings to-day, with rage. 
To one fierce instinct of the primal age. 
The tiger in the j ungle tears his prey — 
But warns his fellows from the feast away ! 
Self, self ! . . . O brother, what does " brother " mean .? 
Strength 's ne'er so strong as crying "Brother, lean ! " 

Is he the anarchist whose hopeful strife 
Affirms the State's decease Man's larger life .? 
Is he of law less baleful enemy 
Who law o'er-rides for self-ascendency. 
Or law manipulates with scheme and plan 
To pluck and prostitute his brother-man .? 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 21 

Who is the baleful socialist ? the wight 
Who holds that social righteousness is right, 
And dreams earth's general product should provide 
A general sustenance, not slip aside ? 
The baleful socialist alone is he 
Who says " Society exists for Me ! " 

Let none believe he gains the spirit's goal 
Whose prayer is for his individual soul ; 
Nor that his earthly bread is more than stone 
Whose mill-wheels rumble for himself alone. 
He highest " prospers " whose intents are high, 
Not bounded by the bounds of "thou " and " I " ; 
He noblest joys who works with Nature's good. 
Evolving harmony where chaos stood ; 
Who holds the universe a Cosmos sound, 
And finds his freedom being nobly bound ; 
Who does his part to banish ill from earth, 
Transforming ignorance to art and mirth ; 
Who asks no cup at Nature's fruitful Fair 
Which others may not quaff in equal share ; 
Who dreams no heaven of arbitrary grace. 
But makes his fellowship the human race. 
'T is he I hail as manly man and true ; 
His knowledge fits him for time's widest view ; 
Philosophy indeed instructs his life, — 
He gains its blessing and avoids its strife. 

Come, Tom ! come, Reuben ! higher see 
Than this- or next world's pelf : 



22 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Oh, who will walk a mile with me 
To banish dreams of self ? 

Come, Frank 1 come, Will ! the jubilee 

Of ages sounds its call ! 
Oh, who will walk a mile with me 

To give himself for all ! 

XI 

Oh, June delight ! Oh, miracle each day 
Which points our path and signals us away ! 
The piled luxuriance of pink and white 
Where orchards lately bloomed, a holy sight. 
Is now transformed to bowers of densest green. 
Where swelling fruits expand each day unseen. 
This wealth unreckoned is our Mother's store. 
Who never paints " No Trespass " on her door. 

Who first called Nature "Mother" ? In his soul 
The partial vanished in the larger Whole ! 
A mother feeds her child with smiles and songs ; — 
No less her milk unto her babes belongs ! 

A lavish Mother has each son of Earth, 
And sky and flower and mountain make him mirth. 
No less her fruits, and every hidden wealth 
Which warms and nurtures him and brings him healthy 
Belong to him by equal right divine 
With airs that circulate and suns that shine. 
A mother lifts not one, thrusts others down, — 
For one a kiss, for one a niggard frown ; 
Each hungering child receives his needful share. 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 23 

And drinks her being as he drinks the air, 

While all her children she in turn would call 

To share with each as she herself with all. 

What son were he, by food maternal blest, 

Who turned and pushed his brother from the breast 1 

A single portion of our own fair land, 
The State where swings the Gulf's prolific strand, 
'Tis said could furnish in its fertile space 
Abundant food for all the human race. 
Unfed ? Unsheltered ? Children pinched and white ? 
A million prattlers crying in the night ? 
Unnumbered women toiling beyond strength 
For just an unknown resting-place at length ? 
Redemptive genius fettered by the chains 
Which bind its energies to earthly planes ? 
Rare souls aspiring like prophetic stars. 
Yet cramped by poverty's unyielding bars ? 
Earth charged with force to fill all right desires, 
And men not daring to connect the wires ? 

Resolved : that Nature's bounty is for Man ! — 
For all enough, for none neglect or ban. 
Resolved : for Mother's babes is Mother's breast ! — 
A cupboard and a couch in one dear nest. 

There is a glory dawning for the race ! 
Each passing year adds beauty to its face, 
Each year adds richer lustre to its eye. 
Each year the heart can feel it drawing nigh. 
As yet, we fathom not its shape or hue. 
But it shall vivify mankind like dew, 



24 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

And add transcendent grace and loftier worth 
To virtue, toil, and genius of the earth. 

Our Mother hails us ! Comrades, — women, men ! — 
All ye who honor her ! with voice and pen 
Do sometJmig — loftily — from day to day 
To bring the year for which the nations pray, 
When none of needed bounty shall go bare. 
But all in Nature's wealth have ample share. 

How shall we put our knowledge best to use .? — 
By freeing earth from error and abuse. 
Cherish your brothers in the daily stress, — 
The calculus uncovers a caress. 

The Mother sings sweet lullaby ; 

Her love would banish moan. 
Oh, who will walk a mile with me 

To bring to Man his own t 

And not America alone is ours 
To lift to beauty and adorn with flowers. 
Love fails which circles land and kin alone ; 
Its lines must reach to farthest race and zone. 
Earth's wine must flow and pity's accents plead 
Not' less for Congo's good than Belgium's need ; ' 
The right must rule, love lisp its sweet " Bismillah," 
No surer in New England than Manila.^ 

' The date of this poem was the period of the Congo atrocities 
and (") of the Philippine controversy. 



MAN'S TRIUMPH -ERA 25 

How shall our " love of wisdom " guide our lives ? — ' 
By nursing prostrate justice till it thrives. 
Put well your knowledge to some frequent use, — 
The Alpine blossom yields its saving juice. 
The truth comes nearest in each latest deed 
Where earth is helped, or they are raised who bleed. 

Man's triumph-era calls, and we 

Should hasten it with song. 
Oh, who will walk a mile with me 

To free the earth of Wrong ! 

Of War, and Woe, and Wrong ! 

XII 

Day's lengthening shadows with the twilight blend ; 
Fraternal ramblings all at last have end. 

One inspiration let our journey give, 
By which our hearts in hopefulness shall live : 
The ivorld grozvs better ! If the paths of wrong 
Seem many, and the road to virtue long. 
This only means that Man's ideals are high. 
And patience needed by who climbs the sky. 

Let knowledge grow ; let men discern their power 
To guide and curb the instincts which devour, 
Till all the mighty passion of the race 
Shall tend to helpfulness and health and grace. 
Here on this planet, — Nature's offspring high, — 
Called ant]iropos because he fronts the sky, — 

' See significance of " Phi Beta Kappa," page 3. 



26 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Man's upward look has brought him on his way 
From life's deep valley shadows to the day. 
And upward, upward still, his feet shall climb. 
His eyes still lifted to the hills sublime. 

Be ours of all men — claiming, as we do, 
Philosophy life's blissful avenue — 
To stand with love's rebuke and stalwart arm 
Across each path which threatens human harm. 
Still lifting high, with faith that never halts. 
The flame which human destiny exalts ; 
Till hoping, longing nations, near and far, 
All rise and follow when they see the star. 



POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



II 

THE EPIC OF MAN 



Read at the Forty-first Annual Convention and 

Festival of the Free Religious Association 

of America, Boston, May 29, 1908 



[The Free Religious Association of America was founded in 1867 
as an affirmation of breadth in the interpretation of religion. Its 
first recorded member was Ralph Waldo Emerson. Among its 
Presidents, Vice-Presidents, and Directors have been Thomas Went- 
worth Higginson, Julia Ward Howe, George William Curtis, Lucretia 
Mott, Moncure D. Conway, Isaac M. Wise, Octavius Brooks Froth- 
ingham, Frederick Douglass, Frank Sanborn, Edwin D. Mead, Jenkin 
Lloyd Jones, and many others of America's leaders in thought, lovers 
of Freedom, and believers in Man.] 



27 



POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

//. THE EPIC OF MAN 



THE EPIC OF MAN 



In these rare days just mellowing into June 
One theme alone could form a poet's rune ; — 
The theme of growth, of springing life from death, 
Of Man each year inhaling holier breath. 
Of Man, then, let me sing, this festal hour, — 
His might, his wisdom, and his glorious dower. 

II 
When human soul first knew itself as soul, 
It did not feel its wondrous power its own ; 
Outreaching to embrace the mighty whole 
Men dreamed the air with gods and demons sown. 
" Our deeds and speech are not our own," said they ; 
" We speak and act as Jove — or Brahm — may sway. 
If Yahweh curse, we sink beneath his frown ; 
As gods approve, so go we up or down." 

But cycles wheeled, and as his vision grew 
Man found himself far greater than he knew. 

28 



THE EPIC OF MAN 29 

He found that he himself, in human Hne, 
Partakes of, and expresses, the divine. 
" Yourselves are gods ! " was Nature's urging call, — 
" Not wind-swept weeds upon a crumbling wall ! " 

Thus all things were transformed — for those who 
saw ; 
For those who recognized deep Nature's law. 
The multitude might still for ages bend, — 
As still to-day, — and prayers with incense blend ; 
But as for those who caught the gleam divine. 
In freedom's birthright they would rise and shine ; 
The universe's forces they would ride, 
Life's evils they would learn to set aside, 
And as their might and wisdom gained in grace. 
So loftier should rise the human race. 
Their fellows might not see — might fear to try 
To grasp the thunderbolts which shook the sky ; 
Might even crucify or strangle those 
Who for their brambles offered them a rose ; 
But for each upward step which man has taken, 
Some god or devil from his throne was shaken, 
Until at last — as latest prophets see — 
A natural world awaits man's husbandry, 
And Sinais now with this new "Table" shine: — 
"The natural alone is the divine." 



30 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



III 
The beauty of the world still glows 
As when the eye first caught the rose. 
Nay ! fairer is the beauty now, 
Since human hands have held the plow. 

Across the heavens the spectral arch 
Beheld by Aryans on their march 
Is wonderful no less to-day 
Than in the primal epochs. Nay, 
A hundredfold its grace has grown 
Since man its cause has seen and shown. 

The whip of fire which lashed the skies 
And scourged with terror ancient eyes, 
To-day is man's most helpful force — 
His voice, his arm, his tireless horse. 

So magic of the human mind 

For man's behoof doth all things bind. 

The crab has burst to luscious fruit, 

The fangs are stricken from the brute, 

The cactus blossoms for his meat. 

The desert smiles a garden sweet. 

And soul — unfathomed heights of soul 

Are yet to brighten, Pole to Pole ! 
The ignorance of man shall cease. 
The deeper things which bring him peace 



THE EPIC OF MAN 31 

Shall spring from out the crudeness now, 
And bind sereneness on his brow. 

The things that perish shall no longer 
In his high purpose be the stronger, 

And all that makes for strength and beauty- 
Shall be with him his happy duty. 

IV 

O patient, eager race ! still seeking out 
Through years — through centuries — the Way of 

Life! 
Vouchsafed no revelation but the pain 
Of error's consequence, no saviour but the joy 
Of strict conformity to Nature's scheme ; 
The deeds that mar, the forces that retard — 
These learning to avoid ; the deeds that build 
And bring to beauty, and transform the brute 
To angel's guise — these following as gleams 
That point the traveler to rest and peace. 

Existence, then, resolves at last to this : 
That men and nations sink to depths of woe. 
Or rise to blessing, in exact degree 
That Nature's boundless forces are ungrasped 
And disobeyed — or loftily sought out 
And loftily pursued to finest ends. 
For at the heart of all is core of good. 
And only good can bless or bring to life, 
And following good is all the Way of Peace. 



32 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

O simple scheme ! to seek and know the way 
And walk in it which bringeth human good ! 
And this is man's chief end — no tangled scheme 
Of brain-wrought fantasy, in ignorance born, 
Upspringing in the years when Nature's ways 
Were undiscerned, uncared for, or opposed ; — 
But loving search and high obedience. 



What universal powers uplift man's life 
Work but through man himself ; — no power outside. 
Without his high, co-operative zeal, 
Exalts him or brings larger loveliness. 
Or eases pain, or lessens any woe. 
High voice thus opes to man's interior ear, 
And bids him bring, himself, on earth, the joy 
For which through ages he in vain has sought 
Uplifting hands of prayer imploringly ! 

Still pray for peace and still rear battle-ships ? 
Nay, brothers, if ye long for beauteous peace. 
Beseech no more the seven-fold silent heavens 
While still up-piling armaments of death ; 
But you yourselves bring peace — by brotherhood ! 
Since brothers' dawn 't is brotherhood which aye 
For brothers hath wrought magic loveliness — 
And so shall be till all mankind are one. 

The blossoms which in Maytime flood the peach, 
Till it reveals a fragrant glory-zone 
Prophetic of the luscious fruit to be, 



THE EPIC OF MAN 33 

Are not more beautiful than brothers' love, 
Nor surer prophecy of sun-kissed fruit. 

But should the peach-tree, in its springtime glow. 
Make wanton with its marvel of delight — 
Possessed it power to use its bursting bloom 
As missiles only, for companions' woe — 
What wreck of might ! what harvest unfulfilled ! 

Behold ! a coming harvest-time of good 
When man's sweet promise is not wantoned more 1 

What sting or grief, my brothers, would remain, 
What rare delight would languish unfulfilled, 
If men themselves should but arise supreme, 
In high co-operation each with each ? 

VI , 

While Nature smiles on every vale and steep. 
Do children starve and willing workers weep ? 
Do women in their misery despair, 
And birth their babes where rabbits would not lair ? 
While Earth, with welcome of rich fruit and grain. 
Bids all to plenteous comfort to attain. 
Do some, by wrong of circumstance or greed. 
Make life a luxury through others' need ? 

Rejoice ! the happy hour of clearer sight 
Is coming, when the rule shall be of Right ; 
When none shall eat unless he also work, 
And none shall wish his rightful task to shirk. 
And none shall toil until his soul is dull 
And shut from prospect of the beautiful, 



34 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

But work and leisure in their proper part 
Shall bring, for all, rich happiness of heart. 
The weeds of selfish sloth and cramping need 
Shall wither in the growths from sweeter seed ; 
Then woman's equal worth shall be confessed, 
Her equal toils with equal prize be blest ; 
Disease shall vanish, and destroying lust 
To mouldering Caves of the Outgrown be thrust 
By simpler living and a loftier aim. 
Born of the might which soul may ever claim 
By drinking at the mighty springs of power 
Which throb around us as our natural dower. 

The mighty Presence which involves us all — 
Each human soul, each whirling, skyey ball ; 
Which thrills through all, and lifts from crude to fair ; 
The Mystery unsolved, yet which doth bear 
In its deep bosom balm for all our strife, 
The Fountain, and the Ocean, of our life, — 
We never nearer than to-day may reach 
To grasp its secret for our futile speech, 
But ever deeper, Man shall enter in 
To use it, and its grace of being win. 

Be this enough ! it is our heaven of hope, 
And Life Eternal is to climb its slope. 
No outer miracle shall bring it near. 
Though sought by man in love or sought in fear; 
But Man himself must gain the sunlit height. 
And share with every soul its air and light. 



THE EPIC OF MAN. 35 

VII 

Is this the Church's work ? ' — I do not know ! 
But 't is the only way the world shall grow. 
If still the Church upon man's side would be, 
It needs but open clearer eyes and see. 
The Church may do it, or may fail to do, 
But Man shall do it — helped by me and you. 

Oh, happy opportunity ! to share 
In making life thus beautiful and fair ! 
You men and women of this race divine, 
Your light amid dispersing gloom let shine ! 
Let not the Past's unwisdom shape To-day ! 
Rebuke the thought which in the gloom would stay ! 
Whatever gods may be beyond our ken 
Are highest served by serving fellow men ; 
Whatever demons people lowest hell 
Are fastest chained by human doing well. 

Be ours to smile, to sing, to work for good. 
To know that Justice cannot be withstood, 
To know that Right shall yet illume the earth — 
If we ourselves but give it glorious birth. 

VIII 

Sing, voices of all birds that trill in June ! 

Your dear delight 
Is symbol of the high ecstatic tune, 



' The general topic at the Convention at which this poem was read 
was The Work of the Church To-day. 



36 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

The radiance bright, 
Which shall encompass Man full soon — full soon ! 

Shine, rays of myriad suns that gleam on high ! 

Your glorious flame 
Is prophecy of lumined earthly sky. 

Known now in name, 
And shortly to be made sweet verity ! 

Rise, human hearts ! too long, too long opprest 

By forces crude ! 
The shackles spurn which leave you still unblest 

Though born to good, 
And after ages' weeping, enter rest ! 



POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

///. MIS CELL A NE O US 



ACCELERANT 



For evil or for good we live each day ; 

Accelerant the good or ill speeds on. 

Brothers and sisters ! ere earth's hours be gone 
What will ye answer while the nations pray ? 

II 
His dream was some high gift to Coming Time. 

But he was powerless — what great deed could he ! 

Modest in name and mien, his mind was free 
And his heart willing. Was there aught sublime .-' 

Temptation came to him. He did not lack 
The taint of blood from old heredity 
Urging him — spelling him. Yet valiantly 

On the alluring ill he turned his back. 

Later came one he loved, and they were wed. 
His children had far less the taint abhorred, 
37 



38 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

While mind and will were trebly in them scored. 
They led the world on after he was dead, 

III 

Unto himself alone no man may live ; 

Accelerant his strength or weakness grows, 
In blessing or in curse, where'er it flows. — 

To coming ages what wilt thou, friend, give .-' 



TO A BABY OF THE TWENTIETH 
CENTURY 

Coming like the morning star 
From unfathomed realms afar ; 
Flower of mingled sowings vast 
In the generations past ; 
Promise of a strength and peace 
Which shall day by day increase, — 
Baby ! heir of all the earth 
Art thou, by thy very birth ! 

Never in a happier day 
Came a child on earth to stay : 
All the comforts toil has wrought, 
All the beauty art has brought, 
Grace of every poet's song, — 
All to thee by right belong; 



MISCELLANEOUS 39 

While each year now counts as ten 
In new benefits to men. 

Walking where the Hght allures, 
Wisdom, little one ! be yours 
To distill in coming years 
Further balm for human fears, 
Adding thy few hopeful grains 
To the harvest Love attains, 
Leaving earthly paths more sweet 
In the passing of thy feet. 



ALPHA AND OMEGA 

[1886] 

Dim in the dark Ionian caves, 

Deep in the Night of earliest Time, 
There trembled low beneath the waves 
A mimic protoplasmic sphere, — 
A globule small, whose curve severe 
Bore in its heart a germ sublime. 

Naught else in all the universe 

Such germ possessed as glowed in this ; 
A germ whose warmth would soon disperse 
The gloom which bound earth's silent corse : 
The germ sublime of deathless Force ! — 
Earth's mystery of mysteries. 



40 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Lichens and moss now found a place — 

Or whence or how, what tongue may tell ? 
And ferns and grasses filled the space 
Where erst dull clods and dust had been ; 
While rustling leaves, with lips unseen, 
Called to the Ages, "All is well." 

Lizards and dragons, monstrous forms. 

Sights that men's eyes would shrink to see ! 
Shrieks above elemental storms ! — 
Ah ! through what pain was life evolved ! 
Only through death and conquest solved, — 
Struggle and blood and agony. 

But see ! a kindlier hour should come ! 

Rapine and force sank, shrinking, low ; 
Thought, invention, showed fairer sum. 
Hither came Man ! — yes, crude indeed, 
But climbing to heart and mind with speed. 
On him the gods their best bestow. 

Love, aspiration, — powers sublime ! 

Sympathy, help, — these Now have place. 
O for the years of Coming Time ! — 
What shall they bring of better yet ? 
Courage ! not yet man's sun is set. 
Good is in store for all the race. 



MISCELLANEOUS 41 



UP TO THE HEIGHTS 

I dreamed the statue of a god 
Stood high in every market-place, 
That all who thither toiling trod 
Might see the beauty of a face 
Noble, and freed in every trace 
From want, from selfishness, from sin. 
Yet seemed it of the human race, 
Nor wholly difl[icult to win. 

Indeed, thrice daily, morn, noon, night, 
To all the hurriers to and fro 
Each statue spake : " The Cosmos bright. 
Each gracious force, above, below. 
Earth's possibilities but show ! 
Man can attain whate'er he feels ; 
Up to the heights 't is yours to go ; 
Your gods are but your high ideals." 

Is this the Vision of the Race ? 
This its high nobleness of heart ? 
Be ours to win that finer grace. 
Ours to do valiantly our part ! 
Thus from the race's ranks shall start 
The sonship truly of the Best, 
And Love's divine and perfect art 
Henceforth be man's redeeming quest. 



42 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



WHAT ARE WE HERE FOR? 

What are we here for, brothers mine, 

Upon this Road of Life ? 
What mean for us the stars that shine, 

The fields with beauty rife ? 
What power hath truth to stir our zeal ? 

What cry hath human need ? 
'Mid earth's conflicting woe and weal. 

What voices should we heed ? 

What are we here for ? Here to grow 

In every grace divine ! ' 
The beauty of the world to know, 

And in its beauty shine ; 
To follow truth where'er it lies. 

Through loneliness and scorn ; 
To hold earth's bounty equal prize 

Of every child that 's born. 

What are we here for in this maze 

Which no man yet hath solved ? 
Here to achieve the noblest days 

Since first the sphere revolved ! 
Not ours to dull the soul with mirth, 

Outdrowning human groan, 
But ours to sublimate the earth 

And bring to Man his own. 



MISCELLANEOUS 43 



THE GREAT 

Around me often, when the twiHght fades, 
Come figures giant-brained, heroic-hearted ; 
In ghostly vigil rise the Great Departed, — 

Of earth's most valiant-souled the deathless shades. 

They stand upon a background glory-walled. 
Returned a little from the fields Elysian. 
As saw the Tuscan in sublimest vision, 

So see I these, and stand enrapt, enthralled. 

They move before me with majestic tread, 

Alive again ! for me anew-created ; 

In mind and figure rehabilitated. 
Though gone from earth the Great are never dead. 

The Great ? Who are the Great ? From distant 
climes. 
From years that mould with age and torture's 

wailing, 
Within my ken a weary host come sailing, — 
The grave gives up old "heroes" of old times. 

Eastward with pomp, from Macedonia's gate. 
Seeking what Asia to his lust might pander, 
I see the drunken glutton, Alexander, 

Cruel and vicious, gain his laurel, " Great." 



44 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Thin-visaged, thundering at earth's western door, 
I see great JuHus in Transalpine valleys. 
How flee the Gauls at his majestic sallies ! 

How faint they at the fearless front he wore ! 

Men hail him as he heads his cavalcade, — 

" O Caesar ! where the warrior that can match 

you ! " 
But, shivering at the base of Pompey's statue, 

I see the rent the envious Casca made. 

Fighter of battles, not in cause of Right, 
But to his kingdom to add lands and oceans, 
Peter of Russia — fertile in high notions, 

Fertile in baseness — ranges into, sight. 

Near him, great Frederick, Prussia's lofty man, 
Great in his will-power — great in his excesses ! 
Little in all that elevates and blesses ; 

Breaker of treaties, liar and charlatan. 

The slaughterer of hordes unveils his face — 
Napoleon, the dazzling and tremendous ! 
What Power, what Progress, did his blood-reign 
lend us ? 

A ruined country, an impoverished race ! 

Thus sadly come they — from years old and late— ^ 
A wan, deluded army, vulture-haunted. 
The host a world's mad dream has hero-vaunted. 

Playing their life-part out — "the brave," "the Great.' 



MISCELLANEOUS 45 

Alas ! how little in them all we see 

Of what we call the gracious, the diviner ! 
Than all this brutehood is there nothing finer ? 

Oh, turn we where sublimity may be ! 

Yea, hither, hither come, O Persian Saint, 
O Buddha of Nepaul, O Syrian Jesus ! 
No longer deeds of blood and conflict please us ; 

For heights of soul — for love — our spirits faint : 

For those who from life's discords brought a tone 
Of richest truth and harmony to greet us ; — 
Pythagoras, Isaiah, Epictetus, 

Saviours in every era, every zone ; 

For Seneca, Contentment's messenger ; 

For Socrates, of all souls lofty, breezy ; 

The Nature-lover, Francis of Assizi ; 
Aurelius, the inward ponderer ; 

The early scientists of Nile and Greece, 

Our own rare searchers, Humboldt, Darwin, 

Spencer ; — 
Above them all there waves the golden censer 

Whose fragrance stills life's harshnesses to peace. 

Yea, those are mortal ; these, immortal ones. 
The world's unselfish, its true blessing-bringers, 
Its painters, sculptors, freedom-lovers, singers, 

Its Shakespeares, Burnses, Lowells, Emersons. 



46 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

And so of all the myriad " nameless " men, 
The faithful women, lovers of self-giving, 
Who lived for something higher than mere living. 

And, losing, have yet doubly gained again ! 

These are the heroes men to-day adore. 
These are the valiant ones above all story ; 
This is the pathway to the modern glory 

Which down the years with added power shall pour : 

The Greatness that the world shall recognize 
In conquest over all its pain and sinning, — 
The Love which was not at earth's far beginning, 

But now is here, and saves and sanctifies. 



NO MORE 

No more the world lifts laurel-leaves to crown 
The wielder of the battle-axe and spear. 
The trade that filled the earth with fear 

And robbed the mother of her hard-won prize 

Her baby with the golden hair and eyes 
Just grown to manhood, fit for fair renown — 

The trade that wrecked with woe 
Wide fields all billowy with ripened grain, 

And turned the rivers' healing flow 
To currents red with wrathful stain — 



MISCELLANEOUS 47 

That trade is passing from the earth. 
No longer entered on with mirth, 
War now is known 
As thing the most obscene 
'Mong all the things terrene ; 
A shame to be outgrown, 
Unmasked in all its evil mien ; 
And conquerors are but butchers whose red hands 
No more triumphant wave through cheering lands, 
But nerveless fall at love's divine commands. 



THE WAIL OF LOW HUMANITY 

[1885] 

Ah, whither shall we look, and whither turn .? — 

Life's road is bleak ! 
About us fiercely wrongs and passions burn : 
For fairer destiny our spirits yearn. 

Where shall we look ? — ah, whither shall we seek .? 
For we are weak. 

Up to the silent heavens in vain we raise 

Our blinded sight. 
Men through the ages, through long years and days. 
Their supplications fond, in prayer and praise. 

Have raised with looks like ours, and faces white — 

Yet sank in Nis^ht. 



48 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

To You, then, who have fought with Fate like us, 

And gained a place ! — 
Who by no aid or gift miraculous 
Have fled the Woe, the Vale Calamitous, 
But in Man's natural might alone, and grace, 
Have won life's race, — 

To You, O Brothers higher up, we turn ! 

Our human kin ! 
Lend J,? the means for us life's heights to earn. 
Uplift with love, where now your brows are stern. 
Y)o ye o'erturn for us earth's wrong and sin, — 

And let us in. 



JUSTICE ! FREEDOM ! 

How shall all mankind be lifted. 

Strength be brought to weakness lowly. 

Toil's oppression-clouds be rifted. 
Right be recognized as holy .? 

Many eras, many sages, 

Life's sublimer words have spoken : 
Flee your blood-stained heritages ! 

Justice ! Freedom ! — these the token. 



MISCELLANEOUS 49 



COURAGE, O WORKERS! 

Blithely the birds in the treetops are shouting their 
matins. 

Hark ! do you hear their glad notes — their seraphic 
rejoicing? 

Nay, 't is the winter's gray fields where we toil and 
endeavor ! 

Far in the Southland they warble, those orioles splen- 
did : 

Give us their olive and palm, their rich tropical 
splendor, 

Give us their warmth and their ease — then our praise 
theirs shall equal ! 

Softly the zephyr chants runes through the leaves of 

the laurel. 
Hush ! do you feel on your cheeks its caress as it 

passes ? 
Nay, 't is a Boreal blast from the caves of the Arctic, 
Hurling its arrows of sleet, that we feel in our faces ! 
Somewhere for others — a few — may blow cinnamon 

breezes ; 
Not for Man yet as a whole are life's sunny Bermudas. 

Up the wide beach curl the crests of the beckoning 
waters. 



so POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Softly they break and submerge the gay circles of 

bathers 
Stretched on the sands or pursuing each other with 

laughter. 
Join in their care-free delight, O my brothers, my 

comrades ! 
Nay, through the ice of the ages we strive and go 

stumbling ! 
Far from our reach trend the shores of Man's southern 

Pacific. 

Courage, O thinkers ! the systems of men are but 

transient. 
Only the system of Man is unique and forever ! 
Man is the one, the eternal, the mighty, triumphant ! 
All that is falsehood he spurns as the centuries hasten, 
All that is wrong he outgrows as his vision increases ; 
Man is himself of his future the master and builder. 

Courage, then, workers ! we strive not in vain in the 
conflict ! 

Upward he climbs — the rude man-child his glory dis- 
covers ! 

Truth shall be gained, and mankind through the truth 
shall be victor. 

Not for a few, but for all, are life's heights and life's 
splendors — 

Summits of thought and of will ! of the soul ! of the 
spirit ! 

Hasten, O earth, to Equality, Brotherhood, Freedom ! 



MISCELLANEOUS 51 



GOOD SHALL CONQUER, NEVER 
FEAR 

[ Tune, " Triumph By-and-by " ] 

Be we the courage-bringers ! 
Let laugh the bells, O ringers ! 
Earth's hero-hearts and singers 

Promise peace. 
Despair and grief why borrow — 
Full long has man had sorrow ! 
Work, joyful, for the morrow, — 

Wrong shall cease. 

Chorus. — Never fear ! Light is growing ! 
Never fear ! Truth is flowing 
Where humanity shall share it, — 

Never fear ! 
Never fear ! clouds are fleeing ; 
Never fear ! men are seeing 
That the Good at last shall conquer, — 

Never fear ! 

With hope and high endeavor 
Earth's great have striven ever 
The bonds of ill to sever, — 
We may trust ! 



52 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

The Past's prophetic preaching, 
The Present's clearer teaching, 
The Future's forward-reaching, — 
Win they must ! 

Chorus. — Never fear ! Light is growing ! 
Never fear ! Truth is flowing, etc. 

Man yet is onward striving, 
All happy Art is thriving. 
The Age of Good arriving, — 

Give it scope ! 
The heights of Being call us ; 
If doubt nor fear appall us 
Life's splendor shall befall us, — 

Work and hope ! 

Chorus. — Never fear ! Light is growing ! 
Never fear ! Truth is flowing 
Where humanity shall share it, — 

Never fear ! 
Never fear ! clouds are fleeing ; 
Never fear ! men are seeing 
That the Good at last shall conquer, - 

Never fear ! 



POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

IV. SOA^NETS 



THE DAYSPRING 



Earth's night is waning ! Beautiful and fair 
The dayspring flashes gold across the deep. 
I see the wailing nations cease to weep, 
For War and Want lie wounded in their lair 

And know their end approacheth. Stricken, — bare, • 
Bewildered by the Day, — the selfish heap 
Of woes that thrive in darkness take their leap 
To escape the sunbeams netting in their hair. 

O human race ! whose hope-illumined heart 
Greets light with light in answering ecstasy. 
Let Love and Wisdom flame to more and more 1 

Flame till there shines on every field and mart 
The longed-for, deathless day of Liberty, 
And every sea laps sunlit Plenty's shore. 



53 



54 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



RECIPROCATION 

Men in all ages have sowed seed for me, 

And I have plucked the ripened fruit and grain. 
Through toil of hand and weariness of brain 
They brought a wealth of luxury to be, 

And I inherit it. The good I see 

And thoughtless thrive in, comes by their long pain. 
Vassals of Nature, they threw off the chain 
And handed me their hard-won liberty. 

What then ? shall I but take ? Nay, also give, 
As eager to enhance the age-long charm. 
And Man still higher reach, still wider hope. 

With simpler, purer pleasures learn to live, 

'Gainst wrongs still rampant lift redemptive arm, 
To Love's best energies give loftier scope. 



THE NEW CREATORS 

How blest am I, who number in my friends 
Rare souls whose labors glorify the earth ! — 
Who seek not honors, but with eager worth 
Urge human destiny to highest ends. 

They toil heart buoyant, though the world contends ; 
With mild persistence they transfigure dearth 
To fulness ; and they meet that higher birth — 
Life "saved " by who alone life freely spends. 



SONNETS 55 

As War is ended ; as Man's age-long blight 

Of Ignorance is vanquished, and his Will beguiled 
To tame earth's crudeness ; as to every child 

Who calls the Earth his Mother more shall flow 
Of her abundance — so these friends may know 
They are "as gods," from Chaos wringing Light. 



DREAM - PROPHECY 

I dreamed last night of standing amid flowers 
That danced and nodded in the fragrant air. 
Charmed with their grace I called and called, till 

there 
Were eager throngs all plucking from the bowers, 

Each handing best to each. My dream seemed hours 
While young and gray, the haggard and the fair, 
Kept plucking — yet the beds grew never bare, 
But faster blossomed. Human song, " Ours, 
ours ! — 

Not mine or thine, but ours ! " outrang as sweet 
As glee of thrushes. His dear hands flung high, 
A child held roses for his sire to view ; 

A man wreathed poppies round his mother's feet : 
"For the first time, dear heart," I heard him cry, 
" Earth's gifts to all men are for me and you ! " 



56 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



LOWELL 

What was thy Message, Poet, to our day ? 

What call of God, earth's meanness to retrieve ? . . 

As when one stands upon a hill at eve, 

And sees rich valleys fade in growing gray. 
Till blooming field and forest-girdled bay 

Are lost in gloom, and man and Nature grieve ; 

Yet, glancing up, finds splendors that relieve, — 

Star-hosts that hold on high their glowing way : 
So, in an age with richest gainings fraught. 

Men have seen Greatness fade, and feared the 
worst ! 

Seen selfishness down-settle like a pall ! 
But lo ! Man's power divine to reach the Ought — 

This the glad light which on thy vision burst. 

Prophetic of Love lord at last o'er all. 



IN ADMIRATION OF WORLD- 
HELPERS 

O earnest Fathers ! sweet-faced Sisterhood ! 

Martyrs and Saints of whate'er faith or dress ! 

Self-spent through years so none be comfortless, 

In thought of others, self in self subdued ! 
Striving to make mankind more pure and good 

By warning word and all unused caress ; 

Earth's saviours ever from perfidiousness. 



SONNETS 57 

Yet scourged and scorned ; oft lacking fire and 
food! 

Would that To-day ^ — this trebly fine To-day — 

We your helped brothers 'mid the world's mad strife 
Might through your love and sacrifices rare 

Be led to walk your same strong, towering way : 
Calming the world that hungereth for life 
By breath of Brotherhood's supernal air. 



CHILDREN'S CHILDREN' 

The Demon Deities of Air and Flood 

Still crumble cities and o'ersurge men's fields ; 
Ambitious War still drenches lands with blood, 
And Avarice its weedy harvest yields. 

Man's conquest. Nature ! of thy forces vast 

Is but begun — thy power still checks his pride ; 
But wait : his skill thy crudeness shall recast, 
And calm thy winds, thy river-courses guide. 

His rein already is upon thy neck ; 

On thine too, Carnage ! — slink into thy cage ! 
And be thou just, O Greed, ere might shall check ; 
Man knows thee mortal as he comes of age. 

Ye weep, earth's creatures, in the present hour ; 

Sing too ! in forecast of your children's dower. 



' Written at the time of. tlie Western cyclones and the Southern 
floods, and of the Turkish and Balkan massacres {1913). 



58 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



DETRITUS 



Could they who till the Mississippi's vales — 

Through thousand thousand leagues far-stretched 

and fair — 
Know well what wealth of distant mountain stair 
Has crumbled to endow their verdant dales ; 

Could they but hear the pounding of old gales 
In lands of Seneca and Crow and Bear, 
Or count the centuries the sun and air 
Have filched from forest-lands with silent flails : 

Did they thus ken how came their rich black earth, — 
By grain and grain from Gardens of the Gods, 
From skyey lines far yonder out of reach 

Where Allegheny, Yellowstone, have birth, — 
What new luxuriance would star their sods. 
How costlier far would gleam each vine and peach ! 

II 

O humankind ! P>om hills where darkness hides, 
From lands of old where lava-torrents hum, 
Down river-ways tumultuous thou hast come, — 
With yet small lodgment found where grain abides. 

How slow the centuries ! how blind the guides ! 
The multitude — how deaf and halt and dumb ! 
Yet steadily Love's wealth adds sum to sum. 
And age by age the flood of Wrong subsides. 



SONNETS 59 

O smiling plains where yet the rose shall bloom, 
The rose of Health, the lilies white of Peace, 
And every golden grain and fruitful vine : 

For thy blest fields we labor to make room. 
Where bitterness of Dead Sea fruit shall cease 
And life grow rich on mingled oil and wine. 



Ill 

And thou — Myself ! Thou, too, in hills unknown 
Hadst thy far rising, and thy lineage 
Lies dimly writ on equi-distant page 
With nebulae ere earth knew sea or zone. 

Dread mystery of Being ! epochs lone 
Onworking steadily with mete and gauge 
To urge old Chaos into Cosmic-stage 
And bring the Age of Man from Age of Stone ! 

Thine ancestry — in body and in mind — 
The fathers of thy healthfulness or pains. 
The mothers of thy victories and fears. 

Oh, who shall probe thy secret depths and find ! 
Small clue thou boldest whom to thank for gains, 
Or who it is that weepeth in thy tears. 



IV 

Did some progenitor who loved the lyre 
Chant to the sunrise in the ages gray ? — 
Is that, O Self, whenever thou wouldst pray, 
Why songs ecstatic in thy soul aspire ? 



6o POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 

Wilful or blindly, did some other sire 

Cry to his passions, " Have thy fill to-day " ? — 
Came thus thy torture when thou wouldst obey 
The law of virtue — all thy frame on fire? 

The Past is gone : it is not dead, but past : 

Its good aggrandize — Time will ease its wrong. 
The Present and the Future — these thy quest 1 

Live that, when gaze of distant years is cast 

Back to thy time by those whose lives are strong, 
Their tribute be, " By him the world was blest ! " 



MEDITATION AFTER THE PASSING 
OF ERNEST CROSBY 

How many stalwart saviours of the race — 

Dear friends of mine — have taken sudden way 

Into the Cave of Silence, and there stay, 

Since first Love's selflessness I learned to trace ! 

Their fiery darts they hurled at earth's disgrace, — 
Then sank to Darkness from the desperate fray ; 
While hordes — great God! — still bask on Hills 

of Day 
And turn on Wrong an unimpassioned face ! 

Oh, who shall dare to tread the earth for naught, 



SONNETS 6i 

His pulse still red, when even from dead dust 
Of Great Ones soars an influence of Might ! 
Oh, meagre men are we who yet have caught 

No soul's contagion from their reverent " Must ! " 
No self-renouncement for Man's larger right. 



O STORY-TELLER ! POET ! 

Shall he his trust betray in whom the spark 
Imperious, creative, urges " Write " ? — 
Content with artful form and glow-worm light 
While dowered Prometheus-like to lume the Dark 

With godlike radiance ? Lift your vision ! hark, 
O Story-teller ! Poet ! — ye whose sight 
Gives you to lessen Man's inglorious plight 
And lure his blindfold eyes to skyey mark ! 

Sound ye the Word which shall transform men's 
thought 
Till they, enfranchised, learn that lowliest deed 
For human brotherhood is loftier prize 

Than ocean contours for which kings have fought. 
Or gold, the pallid recompense of greed. 
Dimmed are Self's torches held 'gainst Love's 
clear skies. 



62 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



RESIDUUM 

I 

Of all who lived aforetime, — hosts on hosts, — 
Dear dark-eyed babes where reedy Nilus swings, 
Sweet Indian maids who danced to vina-strings. 
White souls who peered through Persia's sunrise- 
posts, 

Meek hordes who drooped on China's swarming 
coasts, — 
Dread millions upon millions by the springs 
Of Niger, Danube, Volga, — slaves and kings : 
Of all these now where even are the ghosts ! 

And yet they loved and worshiped, smiled and wept, 
Filled full, as we do, life's allotted page. 
Dreamed dreams of Good, and hoped to see its day. 

When myriad suns have round the planet crept. 
As we of others, so some curious age 
May seek our line, and wonder, " Where are 
they " ! 

II 
And lo ! should some indeed, when we have passed, 
Attempt to trace our footprints in earth's sands. 
Think not we shall have wholly fled the lands : 
What once hath been doth somehow ever last. 



SONNETS 63 

Dead dreams of Ind and Egypt still hold fast 
And fetter Thought in more than iron bands ; 
The labor of the earliest artist hands 
Is with us yet and gives our toil its cast. 

O son of man ! Strong daughter of the race ! 
With you to-day the good or ill resides 
Of myriad souls who yet shall weep and pray. 

What tinge ye give of white or crimson trace 
To thought and deed, eternally abides : 
Ye still shall live — in saint or castaway. 



ENTOMBED 

When base Domitian stained the Caesars' throne, 
A Vestal Virgin dared rebuke his shame. 
Enraged, he clouded her with artful blame, 
Then buried her alive in crypt of stone. 

What solace later, though her truth was shown ! 
The mouldered ear responds to no acclaim : 
Her eyes with dust estopped — despoiled in name — 
She long had perished, woeful and alone. 

Alone ? O World, a host thou hast decried 

And scourged, and buried in their wishful prime, 
Whom later centuries in awe obeyed ! 

Some ev'n to-day, perchance, are thrust aside. 

Entombed though living, who would lift their time : 
In dust of negligence all smothering laid. 



64 POEMS OF HUMAN PROGRESS 



TO YIELD 

Darius, when perhaps he might have won, 

In sudden fear forsook Arbela's plain. 

No vantage then his captains could maintain, 

And the great day was lost, to Philip's son. . . . 
Did some prevision, monarch, through thee run 

That, shouldst thou lose, the mighty world would 
gain .'' 

That in the triumph-shock which knelled thy pain 

Asia, asleep, should hear her sunrise-gun ? 
Oft would earth's progress, for which some men strive 

With bitter tears, — yea, pouring lavish blood, — 

Be sooner summoned if they fled the field ! 
Outworn the methods which they pray may thrive ! 

Mankind sweeps past them with resistless flood. 

Oft highest victory is still to yield. 



POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 

/. MISCELLANEOUS 



EARTH'S GOLDEN PRIME LIES 
INFINITELY ON 

[18S3] 

" If ye continue in my word," said he 

Who walked of old through flower-sprent Galilee, 

" The truth ye then shall know." Ah, teacher great ! 

Thy word the world's late years still illustrate. 

Thy gospel was of simplest thought and deed : 
Two words alone thy all embracing creed, — 
To seek ! to love ! — the utmost truth to seek ; 
In love for man that utmost truth to speak. 

"And ye have heard it said of olden time, 

' Lo, this ! ' ' Lo, that ! ' But, nay ! earth's golden 

prime 
Lies infinitely on, where none can see. 
A new commandment, therefore, give I thee." 

New days require new thoughts, new words, new 

works. 
Blasphemer he who those new meanings shirks ! 

65 



66 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 

Shall men forever only backward glance ? — 
That were to serve but shame and ignorance. 

"The truth that is, I come not to destroy " ; — 
Truth's service, rather, is divinest joy ! 
The Past did well — it could but blindly see. 
To larger knowledge be as faithful we ! 

O lover wise on hills of Palestine ! 

If still the power to seek and love be thine, 

What joy thou hast, though Truth thyself o'er-arch, 

That Man still hastens on his upward march ! 



"SIGNS AND WONDERS" 

[1882] 

I ask not " miracles " to guard my faith 

And keep it from the clutch of grim Despair ! 

To me a miracle is but a wraith, 

While Gracious Fact is mine in earth and air. 

In Nature's Constancy I find my joy ; 

I know that Good has been, will always be. 
And now in manhood, even as a boy, 

I ask but Natural Opportunity. 

I ask but still the rosy light of morn, 

The strength that after rest makes labor sweet ; 
To know the simpler deeds that life adorn. 

That I may follow with glad, willing feet. 



MISCELLANEOUS e'j 

Beauty doth everywhere paint sights for me, 
Raising the dead at heart to Ufe divine ; 

I view the dawn-winds walking on the sea, 
Suns in rich vineyards making water wine. 

Concentric circles of earth, wave, and sky, 
Cut by the far horizon's purple rim, — 

All come as miracle, — as such go by, — 
And all compel from me the grateful hymn. 

The laws Mind follows to Thought's farthest zone 
In conquest over Nature's secrets vast, — 

These, too, I know who studieth makes his own, 
Gaining rare triumphs that his life outlast. 

The fossils in the rocks I count my prize, — 
More eloquent by far than o'er-writ " Text " ! 

They are God's own Epistle for man's eyes, 
Not records fifty scribbling monks have vext. 

And yonder Lights ! . . . O tireless-swinging Orbs ! 

Not in a trillion years one hair's-breadth free 
From paths the Energy which all absorbs 

Swung vastly for your whirling ecstasy ! — 

A " Bible " ye indeed ! wherein I scan 

Forces which never tire, retrace, nor bend ; — 

From which I solve, or seem to solve, for Man, 
The law on-urging him to some fine end. 

Nor these alone, but thousand sounds and signs, 
Around, beneath, within, in soul and clod, 



68 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 

A child's sweet kisses, Summer's purpling vines, 
These all proclaim the animating God. 

So onward go I, silent in the crowd ; 

I hear the clamor, but I answer not. 
What harm to me their whisperings low or loud ! 

The Law Eternal can they change a jot .? 

And for the rest, — our own small arc of Time, — 
Though little know I, much I hope and trust. 

At any rate, mine nozv the Power Sublime, 
Not into cycles dead and distant thrust ! 

Yea, for the rest I am content to know 

For ages yet shall Spring nor Autumn cease ; 

While, east or west, — where'er I turn or go, — 
A Voice in pines, in wheatlands, whispers ** Peace ! " 

Let others in dim child-world dreamings dwell, 
Still bolstering bravely up their marvelous tales. 

Roaming through Purgatories, Heavens, and Hell 
With faith that must have "miracles," or fails ! — 

Ample for me is Nature's hourly wealth. 

Her Present wonders, — helpful, lavish, sure! 

With these, and open eyes, my soul finds health ; 
Through life and death my victories endure. 



MISCELLANEOUS 69 



TO TRUTH — MY GOD 

[1883] 
Till ages fail, 

And love receives its own ; 
Till ^Eons pale, 

And faith is wiser grown, 
Be Truth my God. 

I may not always live 

My high Ideal, 
But high resolve I give, 

Come woe or weal. 
To Truth — my God. 

And thus, I feel. 

My soul shall never fail ! 
The buds that heal 

Pass not with frost or hail, — 
They grow to more ! 

And though eye may be dim. 

And sense be weak. 
My heart still chants its hymn. 

Soul joy doth speak — 
God more and more. 



70 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 

"PREPARED" 

[1888] 

I know not why good men should say 
That he who dreams a dream divine, 
And seeks it, soulful, does not " pray " ! 
That he who still sees Beauty shine 
Through all life's ill, and flowers entwine 
With solar glow to hide earth's gray, 
Is drunk with " irreligious " wine — 
Because he does not " pray " ! 

Nor know I why good men should sigh, 
Deeming him far from good and God 
Who yet in darkness hears Love's cry ; 
In lambent orb and lowliest sod 
Progressive Order can descry, 
A Process broad and deep and high ; — 
Finding alike in soul and clod 
A ''very present " God ! 

I know not why good men have sought 
To speak him " Christless " who yet goes 
In paths the Galilean taught, — 
Seeking what he his neighbor owes, 
Striving poor lives with misery fraught 
To heal of something of their woes. . . . 
" But ah ! he cries not ' Lord ' — and ought ! 
This man of ' Christless ' thought ! " 



MISCELLANEOUS 71 

Still, o'er him flushes golden sky ! 
Better than Night he loves the Day. 
In the divine he dwells, say I, — 
So close he has no need to " pray " ; 
More than his want is the supply ! . , . 
So, "doing the Will," and " knowing the Way," 
He standeth needy world-souls nigh, — 
" Prepared " to live or die. 



DEEPER AND HIGHER 

Oh, blest that as the centuries fly 
Man's soul doth deeper, higher roam ! 
Yet feels the more that earth and sky 
Are but a vaster temple home : 
Temple that needs no sun to thrill. 
So grand its inner, fadeless light, — 
The godlike, in the human, still 
Redeeming it from evil plight. 

Above the clamors of our day, 

Which heedless drown the still small voice. 

We hear a mightier Presence say : 

Rejoice, O sons of men ! rejoice ! 

Be open still to prophets' cry ; 

Go on to keener insight yet ! 

Much still remains of deep and high 

Ere suns and stars of God are set. 



72 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



GOD AND MAN 

Where is beauty ? Where is grace ? 

What life their strength embodies ? 
Look within a human face : 

Where love and help are, God is. 
Seek this mystery to trace ! — 
Heaven and earth its lines embrace, 
Souls, and suns, and stellar space. 

Wondrous is the mighty Power 
Wherein we have our being ! 
Every day and every hour 

Brings joy for hearing, seeing ; 
Joy of stream and star and flower, 
Joy of sky-flung spectrum-bower, 
Planet-haze and atom-shower. 

Love, no less, of human hearts. 
Which makes all life worth living, 

From the One, the Only, starts, 
Man's highest glory giving. 

This to know transcends all arts : — 

From the Whole the partial darts ; 

Man's love God's love counterparts. 



MISCELLANEOUS 73 



MAN'S BEST WORD GOD'S 
TRUE WORD 

[1891] 

The highest Truth is ever Word of God. 

"My doctrine is not mine," said he of old, 
" But His that sent me." And the fabled rod 

Which Moses wielded was not his, 't was told. 
But " symbol " only, of a Vaster Power 
Which feebly he forthshadowed for an hour. 

Too much our human selves we separate 
From the Divine Effulgence which is All ! 

A Deity far off we paint, and prate 
Of God as hid behind dividing wall. 

Such dream as this is shadow drear and dun — 

A glow-worm dimness, not the wondrous sun. 

No Word of Good was ever breathed not God's ! 

No stroke for Freedom but God held the arm ! 
Lo, then, to-day, these Creeds' o'erturning sods — 

They token Heaven's rejoicing, not alarm. 
Oh let us deem Man's own best Word of Hope 
Still God's true Word, and Man's best horoscope. 



74 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



THE LIBERTY WHEREWITH WE 
ARE MADE FREE 

When thought of what the God may be 
Oft changes Hke the changing sea, — 
Revealing that Man's needs profound 
To deeper depths of Being sound ; 
When saviours vanish in a cloud 
Attenuate as Enoch's shroud ; 
When Bibles shrink to myth and tale, 
And Church's magic Credos fail, — 
Then glows the heart triumphantly : 
At last the soul of man is free ! 
Tradition binds no more his sight — 
His searching meets Eternal Light ; 
Though gleam of cross and altar shrinks, 
His spirit at life's fountains drinks ; 
In place of signs and symbols weak 
He hears his own high conscience speak ; 
His soul the Beautiful and Good 
Embraces as its habitude ; 
In truth of self and toil for man 
He finds an all-sufficing Plan, — 
And is content to know the Whole 
Embraces origin and goal. 



MISCELLANEOUS 75 



THE AGE OF GOOD 

Mankind has waited long ; 

Still saved by hope it waits, 
Calming its eagerness with song 

While quelling fears and hates. 

No more the soul is bound 
By childhood's partial creeds : 

Love makes the earth all holy ground 
And fills all human needs. 

War's trumpet still may peal, 

And Greed with Greed may fight, 

But they who shape earth's future weal 
Urge Brotherhood and Right. 

The flashing sunlight clear 
On many a mountain's head 

Is symbol of earth's passing fear ; 
Wrong's shadowy hosts are fled. 

O happy Age to Be, 

When Ignorance lies prone 1 
When Love has perfect liberty, 

Nor meets for bread a stone ! — 

Be ours to sing thy praise, 

Be ours to aid thy birth. 
And earlier bring the wished-for days 

Of Righteousness on earth. 



^6 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



IN THE NAME OF GOD 

[1892] 

Ah, Conclaves, Councils ! " In the name of God " 
Ye judge your fellows, wielding creedal rod. 

"As servants of the Meek of Galilee" 

Ye smite and maim — but not by his decree ! 

Up, and awake ! Ye strive in vain to stay 
With banning words the sunrise of To-day. 

Still " who is not against "is on Truth's side, 
And with him angels ever shall abide. 



STAR AND CROSS 

[1887] 

" The time has come when all men shall be free ! " 
Thus in my dream an Angel spake to me : 
An Angel on whose forehead gleamed a Star, — 
Beneath whose feet reclined a shattered Spar. 

Bright was his countenance, though dread his word ! 
Raptured I gazed, but shuddered as I heard : 

" I am inspirer of the Modern Seer : 
Knowledge^ — 'Star-eyed,' men call me, and do well 1 
Secrets of Past and Coming Time I tell ; 
Earth's child-conceptions fade now I am here ! 



MISCELLANEOUS 'j'j 

In hope foundationless, enmixed with fear, 

Before the Central Scaffold of the years 

Full long a time a thoughtless world has bowed. 

Now see we clearer ! clearer still shall see ! 

Take hence the Cross ! — here, wrap it in its shroud ! 

In reverence bear it — wet with wasted tears — 

Futile as sign of Immortality — 

To Arimathean Joseph's rock-cut tomb 

(Where he for Greatness made in love fair room). 

And lay it where its Victim's ashes be ! 

The Star henceforth be symbol — stars give light : 

The Cross's origin was Dreams and Night." 

The Vision smiled, and light upon me broke. 

But some — " It thundered, not an Angel spoke ! " 



THE NEW EVANGEL 

[1889] 

Come to the cradle, and bow : 
Knowledge is Saviour now. 
And the airs that blow 
And the waters that flow — 
The Forces of Nature 
Increasing Man's stature — 
Are the modern Angels 
That murmur Evangels. 
Seize on them while you may ! 
Be blest in the life of To-day ! 



78 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



UPLIFTS OF HEART AND WILL 

Uplifts of eager heart and earnest will ! 

Pulsings of soul ! — 
These, in their high, unintermittent surge, 

Make Being whole. . . . 

Surgings of Spirit tow'rds the unknown Source 

Whence cometh all ; 
Surgings of Will to Duty, fair or hard, 

Whate'er befall : 

Ambitions high, to follow nobly out 

The earthly Real ; 
Resolves no less to breathe Heaven's purer air — 

The far Ideal ! 

Strugglings for self — to win and nobly use 

Time's fairer good ; 
Strugglings sublime for others — to make fact 

Man's brotherhood. 

Not surgings for an hour to rush and roar. 
And then subside ; 



MISCELLANEOUS 79 

But higher, holier surgings, that shall pour 
In endless tide. . . . 

These are the Race, the Goal, the Home, the God, 

In all earth's strife ; 
These are, and shall be ever, soul of soul, 

And life of life. 



TRANSFORMATION 

Full long the years to Man were all unkind ; 

To what was highest in him he was blind. 

The Seer was born, and opened were men's eyes 
To visions splendid and celestial skies ! 

We are not clay alone — mere sons of earth — 

But born of highest in the universe. 

In soul nor matter is inherent curse. 

By noble striving we dispel life's dearth. 

And gaining selflessness we meet a birth 

To fairer good than fabled gods disburse. 



8o POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



IN SECRET 

" O ye gods, grant me to be beautiful in soul." — Socrates. 

'Mid quiet hills (the yearning spirit's quest ! ) 

This dear wild aster, in its lonely place 

In Wildcat Notch — -'gainst rocky wall hard pressed- 

Blossoms as freely, with as perfect grace, 

As if amid some hundred-poppied nook 

In parkways where the eager thousand look. 

O Power unknown, — unknown for all my cry ; 

Forever in thy solveless mystery clad, — 

Behold ! oft likewise lift I quiet face 

In regions lonely, with no passer by ! 

Would that some perfectness, transmuting bad. 

Might shine in me, though seen not by the race. 



WHENCE THE GLORY? 

From out this swaying tent of sunlit green. 
This fragrant pine-tree in whose shade I lie, 
What melody, accusing while serene, — 
What whisper, — answers my impatient cry } 

" Thou little knowest of the far and high, 
And pain is present in the near and seen ? 



MISCELLANEOUS 8i 

Thou knowest not of bliss beyond the sky, 

But spurnest threats of an abysmal deep ? 

Thou art not reconciled that such as Man — 

When falls the darkness — should forever sleep ? 

O'er virtue human waywardness holds ban ? 

Oppression hastes, while love and justice creep ? . . . 

What if Life's Mystery thou canst not span ! 

Enough that day by day thy duty shows ! 

Enough that conscience sings of high estate. 

And, when thou sinkest, makes thy heart elate ! 

When out from primal Chaos love arose. 

It was the flashing of a faithful sun 

With promise of a fair and fruitful earth 

Where will and longing should meet radiant dower." 

"But love and will," I answered, "are of Man, 
Through weary centuries accumulate ! " 

" Yet was it not in Nature man had birth, 
As still through Nature he ascends to power ? — 
Yet more and more to climb, as wisdom grows, 
Till haply love and God are seen as One ? 
Hath not my green its glory from the sun ? " 

Thus greenly sang my pine-tree all the day, 
Till blest I rose, and went my hopeful way. 



82 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



"LABORERS TOGETHER" 

I live not far from Thee. I grasp Thee not — 
Thy secret Being still unknown abideth ! 

But life's sweet good — Thy good — through mine 
is shot, 
And when I err, Thy silent mandate chideth. 

Thy mandate ? — or my own ? Transcendent 
Thine ? — 
Or mine by human heritage through ages ? 
The faiths accumulate at human shrine 

At last have merged as one these two bright 
pages ! 

In Thee I live, and Thou no less in me : 
Through all eternities we wend together. 

In aught can I work answering help for Thee .? — 
Yea, live to add to Love's white wing a feather. 



POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 

//. SONNETS 



SEARCH 

What thought of God have hungering men to-day 
That they themselves have not sought out and 

found ? 
What spot of earth is christened holy ground 
But where high souls have walked their human 
way ? 

What laws and precepts by which sages say 
Life's good is best set free and evil bound, 
But came from fine endeavors proven sound 
By loves and agonies of young and gray ? 

All faith, all knowledge, springs in man's own heart, 
And from his partial sight he moulds his creed. 
Not thinking he shall wider know and see ! 

Henceforth mankind shall learn this wiser part : — 
Who honors Truth, in thought and word and deed, 
He best, O mighty Marvel, worships Thee. 



83 



84 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



LOFTIER GOOD 

O hungering earth ! in these aspiring years — 

Which build new faiths hke blossoms from the sod, 
Still seeking higher heaven and higher God — 
What mightier hopes are thine, transforming fears ! 

What vaster sight ! No cause for grief or tears. 
But loftier good than any when men trod 
With fixed stern faces fearing threatening rod, — 
Since now a manlier onset charms our ears : 

Hiffh onset for the Truth whate'er it be ! 

o 

For only in the Truth can rest be found. 
Or Brotherhood, or knowledge of The Way. 
Rejoice, O world long drugged with fantasy ! 
Through Truth shall every ill at last be bound. 
And good increasingly hold life in sway. 



WORSHIP 

Must fear indeed accept what love denies, 
And faith receive what reason bids disdain 1 
Can priestly word wash out hate's caustic stain, 
Or cross or shambles purge a soul of lies } 

O signs and symbols by which conscience buys 
An anaesthetic for its soul-birth pain, 
Too long ye charm a world which seeks to gain 
A listless mansion in the dubious skies. 



SONNETS 85 

Arouse, O child of mystery unguessed ! 

Put goodness in thy life and in thy creed ! 

To-day well lived best wins the day to be 
And finds it in undreamed-of beauty dressed. 

Tradition's staff is but a broken reed, 

While love and truth uphold the skies and sea. 



REVELATION 

What hast thou heard, O soul, with inward ear. 
That makes all written Word to thee seem 

naught ? . . . 
Upon the Shore Eternal I have caught 
The rhythmic murmur, — "One are There and 
Here, 

And Life and Death ! All, all is void of fear ; 
The Power that out of lowliness hath brought 
The rose to beauty, and man's spirit fraught 
With godlike aims, still pulsates every sphere ! 

We live, we love, — we vanish. Still we are. 
And in eternal round we live and grow. 
And love again, and rise to more and more. 

O ye who suffer ! all your grief unbar ! 
Ye suffer only while ye hug your woe. 
No tempest shatters on this deeper shore." 



86 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



"OF ONE" 

Jesus, thy teachings oft have made me smart 
When I have failed in love for fellow men. 
Siddartha, grief has been my portion when 
Thy selflessness has taught my feverish heart 

Its vain ambitions. When some coward start 
Has seized me, thou, Mohammed, then 
Hast stirred to bravery. Thy moral ken, 
Confucius, spurs me when I fail life's better part. 

O saviours many, of time old and new ! — 
Alike ye lead from darkness to the light. 
O words as high within my own calm breast ! — 

No less ye summon Wisdom to pursue. 
Still sound, O clarions of love and right, 
Till I win Freedom serving your behest. 



THE MOTHER 

Why should we limit Power and Mystery 
To one poor pronoun of our human speech ? 
Has deity no higher, wider reach 
Than we can grasp when glibly we say "He .-" " 

The fertile universe at least is " She," 

Fruitful in brain and pinion, flower and peach ; 
And ever dumb when we its face beseech, 
It seems but " It," it stands so silently. 



SONNETS 8; 

O mighty Mother ! — foremost art thou this ! 

And we thine offspring, clinging to thy breast ! 

Thou givest us the stars and streams for toys ; 
In thy benignant smile alone is bliss. 

Though ignorant, in thy wise calm we rest, 

And when thou frownest, darkened are our joys. 



BEACON -LIGHTS 

The brilliant beacon-lights that bound the shore 
With hope to storm-tossed mariners are fraught : 
What matter, so their radiance be caught. 
They flash from rock, or bluff, or beach, or tower ? 

The sailor doubts not their propitious power, 

But heeds their warning with his every thought : 
He heeds their warning, and the ship is brought 
To home and harbor in a happy hour. 

Along the headlands of life's perilous sea 

Beam steadfast lights of human will and love ! 
What matter, Jew, Greek, Christian, if the light 

Be followed faithfully ? It then shall be 
A Guiding Light indeed, to Ports above : 
A pillar of cloud by day, of fire by night. 



POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



RELIGION AS A LIFE 



Religion is to eat and drink for health ; 

Keep body sweet and clean, and breathe full deep ; 
Hold supple frame and mind the highest wealth ; 
Through honest toil each day earn soundest sleep. 

II 
Religion is to seek the good of Man ; 

To give each child a welcome on earth's ball ; 
Put private avarice 'neath scornful ban ; 
Make every "good " a joy and strength for all. 

Ill 
Religion is to find a child's repose 

In Nature's beauty and Law's rhythmic beat ; 
To deem the wonder of an opening rose 
Symbolic of the Heart of Things as sweet. 

IV 

With soul entranced by the mysterious all, 
Be ardor mine to meet religion's call ! 



SONNETS 89 



'I WILL LAY MINE HAND UPON 
MY MOUTH."— 5^0^ of Job 

[Written after listening to extended theological speculations 
followed by heated eschatological discussion] 

O wondrous Power in which we live and move, — 
As gods in greatness for our moment's space ! 
Not ours the mighty mystery to trace 
Of How and What, — nor doth it us behoove 

To wail, despairing, that we cannot prove 
The very lines on some benignant Face, 
Or through ethereal mazes with Thee race 
To oil for Thee each planetary groove ! 

Enough if human brotherhood abounds ; 
Enough if earth to-day is fair and wide 
Nor crashes yet, a cinder, to its doom ! 

And as for problems of extended grounds, 

And as for place where myriad souls can bide. 
The " infinite " can scarcely lack for room ! 



90 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



RECOGNITION OF ONENESS 

Pervasive Power ! — all present and all free ! — 
Within whose greatness I myself am great ! 
Since first I recognized myself in Thee 
Where are my burdens flown, my low estate ? 

Ye pains of earth, that held me in your power, 
Beclouding the divine I vainly sought, — 
Say ! whither did ye vanish in that hour ? . . . 
Ah, pains, ye cannot answer — ye are naught ! 

Within myself are the Eternal Springs, 
And rise they high as I myself rise high. 
What wonder that uncramped my spirit sings, 
And that I younger grow as seasons fly 1 

Since I am one with all the Good there is, 

No prayers I have, but only symphonies. 



SONNETS 91 



WINGS 

When earth's first parents, in the legend old, 
Had tasted Knowledge and discerned it sweet, 
They gave their innocence for freedom bold. 
And, singing, to new pathways turned their feet. 

Methinks no flaming sword, with point of light, 
Now turning this way and now turning that. 
Was needed to preserve that gateway bright, — 
For who would linger where that angel sat ! 

No Eden past can equal Eden new ; 

Oh, renegade to God whose will is weak ! 
Forever overhead love's skies are blue. 
Forever doth the voice at evening speak. 

On Wisdom's pinions endless beauties wait ; 

And where are wings, what service is a gate ? 



92 POEMS OF RELIGIOUS PROGRESS 



"TO THINE OWN SELF BE TRUE" 

These forward shocks still speak my course aright ! — 
For me no port can ever lie astern. 
East, and still east, the Morning's signals burn. 
And I must follow where I see the light. 

On every hand fair ships take shoreward flight, — 
So help me Heaven my course I cannot turn ! 
Not once since early start did bosom yearn 
To lie at ease again on coasts of Night. 

And recompense ? Oh, much ! One closest friend, 
With whom for evermore I still must steer, 
Would spurn me if I veered to west or south ! 

But having him my lover to the end, 
No other paradise could be so dear, 
No tropic's kiss so sweet upon my mouth. 



POEMS OF LIVING 

/. MISCELLANEOUS 



MAN'S OPPORTUNITY 

I 
He does not think — he does not know : 

A wave is breaking on the shore ; 

A wave surcharged with richest ore 
And tinged with deepest golden glow. 

He heeds it not — he does not know : 
It scatters pearls athwart his path ; 
It bathes as in a purple bath 

The boundaries where his feet must go. 

He heeds it not — he passes by : 
It breaks, it bursts upon the strand, 
Its wealth is squandered on the sand. 

Its pearls in shattered fragments fly. 

II 

He does not know — he does not guess : 
A flower is blossoming at his feet ; 
A flower is offering incense sweet — 

And fading in the wilderness. 
93 



94 POEMS OF LIVING 

He heeds it not — he passes on : 
Its purple petals droop and die ; 
Its wealth is wasted on the sky : 

It might have bloomed by Helicon. 



Ill 

He does not know — he does not dream : 
A star is flaming in the sky ; 
A star that passes swiftly by, — 

A star of high, transcendent gleam ! 

He sees nor feels its cheering light : 
It glows and gleams indeed, to-day ; — 
To-morrow, deepening into gray, 

Shall find it vanished in the Night. 

IV 

He does not seek — he does not think : 
A fountain gushes at his hand : 
Its wealth he does not understand : 

He looks nor moves, nor stoops to drink. 



He does not think — he does not know : 
A song is trembling through the air ; 
A bird is warbling anthems rare 

And murmuring lyrics sweet and low. 



MISCELLANEOUS 95 

He hears nor heeds — he passes on : 
And wings are raised — a birdling flies ; 
The trembling cadence fails and dies : 

The anthem and the bird are gone. 

VI 

He does not see — he does not take. 

A wave, a flower, a star, a song, 

A fountain — all to him belong. 
Oh, when shall he arise, awake ! 



UNGRASPED 

On many a marvel which Nature discloses 
Man's eye never looks, and the daintiest roses 

Bloom wild where his footsteps may never have 
stirred. 

Unseen by man's eye, and untouched by his hand, 
Lie treasures unnumbered awaiting command 
If only his heart and his will say the word. 

With noble realities life is replete ; 
But he who shall seek them with wandering feet 
Shall never earth's best benediction have heard. 



96 POEMS OF LIVING 



THYSELF WITHIN 

Amid the ceaseless loss and change 

Of time and friends and all below, — 

(O things we love ! how swift ye go ! 

O things that are ! how new and strange ! ) 

Ah, whither shall our spirits range 

A more eternal hfe to know ! 

In Syria, Ind, or Egypt sought, 

One answer only have the years 

Sent down to banish hopes and fears : — 

Within thyself vanst heaven be caught 

And captive held, — or all is tears ! 

For this saints died and martyrs fought. 

Thyself within ! Thyself within ! 

O soul, find here thy strength, thy peace. 

Pray not that loss and change may cease, — 

Pray, rather, higher heights to win ! 

Thy spirit's loftier wings release. 

And soar thee where thou art akin ! 



MISCELLANEOUS 97 



THE PATH OF SUN 

Across the harbor's placid wave 
The pathway of the sun is bright. 

The orb uprising from its grave 
Has pushed away the angry night, 

And now the beating sea is still, 

And lit from Heaven's hill. 

wings of white that flit across ! 
You sails that flash and fall and rear ! 

1 know not what of pain or loss 

The souls you carry bear or fear ; 
I know this hour their eyes are bright 
With morn's exultant light. 

O heart of mine, O faith of mine, 
You have not sunk or wailed at loss ; 

You fathom not the far divine. 

But light with smiles each daily cross ; 

And still your path till life is run 

Shall be the path of sun. 



98 POEMS OF LIVING 



LIFE'S MEANING 

[1889] 

Oft, when I have walked at dawning by the margin 

of the sea, 
Of the hopefulness of Nature it has sung its song 

to me. 

With a soul tow'rd light determined I have sought 

its secret word. 
And its accents have been music I have elsewhere 

never heard. 

True, the sea itself is " cruel " — never shrinks it 

back for pain. 
But its tide-falls cleanse the continents, its mists 

bring tender rain. 

So throughout the whole of Nature ; — there is evi- 
dence of good. 

Bringing order out of chaos, smiling fields where 
oceans stood. 

And 't is thus — a meaning finding even in its harsh- 
est strife — 

That I follow onward cheerly through this wondrous 
thing called life. 



MISCELLANEOUS 99 

Life ! whose warp is ceaseless effort, while its woof 

is Progress still, 
As it was through countless epochs ere the world 

knew human will. 

Life ! the symphony whose harmony would languish 

into death 
If it never knew the discord which brings out its 

sweeter breath. 

Life ! the fair and boundless continent, amid whose 

sunlit ways 
We enact heroic dramas, living nobly-eager days. 

True, our petty "titles " vanish — but we live not for 

a "name " ; 
To exist in added world-good were a thousand times 

the fame ! 

And we know we cannot act a deed of good or deed 

of ill 
But its ends, accruing ever, through eternities shall 

thrill. 

He who, aching, tills the cornfield, in whatever valley 

far — 
Nobler he in manhood's best than any war-left living 

scar. 



lOO POEMS OF LIVING 

Toiling scientist and poet, seeking Mother Nature's 

best — 
In the growing good of ages far outweigh they all 

the rest. 

Nobler he than lords of wealth, who in the smart of 

modern need 
Reaches lowly hand of help to bridge the stream of 

human greed. 

So on life's unmeasured rim we nobly act, nor seek 

return : 
While before us, steadfast ever, Hope's eternal 

torches burn. 

And 't is worth the struggle ! . . . Faithless ! faithless 

of our Mother Nature's power 
To sit down with dull despairings, or to hopeless wail 

an hour ! 

Are not we a part of Nature ? Then to us the 

new-age call 
The long prayer of years to answer, and on earth 

bring peace for all. 

Here no room for "floating foam-wreaths wafted down 

from moonlit shores " ; 
Here the summons to work desperate while the hot 

sun deadly pours ! 



MISCELLANEOUS loi 

Brothers ! know you not men languish for the help 

that you can give ? 
Spend your years in action ! action ! that a dead world 

may new-live. 

What though selfish hordes pledge wine-cup at the 

banquet or the rout ? 
Here our place is — to bring joyance to these hungry 

eyes without. 

Oh, the happiness of living, when we claim a lofty 

work ! 
'Tis in faithful future Doing that the good of man 

shall lurk. 

Life shall then have purpose for us — we shall see it 
is divine ; 

And in fact, not dreamings longer, shall the flower- 
decked Eden shine. 

Not in vain we seek Life's meaning. If we lift our 

heedful eyes 
Voices everywhere enthrall us — the whole universe 

replies. 



102 POEMS OF LIVING 



FUTURES 

Futures flash not into being, 
Futures are results of Presents. 
When the call of Duty beckons, 
Brother, be not thou the laggard. 
Justice waits thy strong endeavor. 



COIN IN ANY REALM 

With place, with gold, with power — oh, ask me not 

With these my little hour of life to blot. 

A little hour indeed ! and I would fain 

Its moments spend in what is worth its pain. 

What traveler would faint through troublous lands 

To gather only what must leave his hands 

The moment that he takes his homeward ship ? 

Earth's goods and gauds give every man the slip ; 

But wealth of Thought, and richer wealth of Love, 

Must pass for coin in any world above. 

The good to others done while here I strive 

Is all at last that shall my dying shrive ; 

And setting sail, my slight self-conquest's store 

Is all my freight if I shall come to shore. 



MISCELLANEOUS 103 



SOUL'S PARADISE 

All zones I searched — in pain — in glee 
For Paradise, sweet Paradise. 

Its stately towers I ne'er could see : 
Faint Paradise, far Paradise. 

Still on I toiled courageously 

Tow'rd Paradise, dear Paradise. 

As I approached, its walls would flee : 
Sad Paradise, false Paradise. 

I ceased my quest ! It then found me ! 

Close Paradise, self-Paradise ! 
Now hourly, where I go or be 

Is Paradise, soul's Paradise. 



FOREVER ON 

I would not look at life's high aim aslant ! 
Life is for growth ! It is a mountain plant. 
Its roots descending, but its leaves upspread ; 
A shoot divine, whose seeds, when we are dead, 
Should spring immortally in other life, 
Potent in tendencies to nobler strife. 
Showing the soul's high lure, till Time be gone, 
To Be, to Do, and so forever on. 



I04 POEMS OF LIVING 



"IN THY YOUTH" 

What is true manliness ? With banner's sweep 
To flaunt abroad that powers have come full tide ? 
With scornful lawlessness to blazon wide 
The sacred fire each life should sacred keep ? 

To come full-orbed, yet mightily to know 

The Titan thrill of holding power in thrall — 

This is true manliness ! and this the call 

For thee high flung which diamond trumpets blow. 



SOUL AND SENSE 

Who that perceives the mocking flare of sense, 
Or catches vision of the orb of love. 

Can doubt which glow shines sweetest recompense 
The valley murk, the unwavering star above ? 

Yet oh, the paradox ! that those in shame 

Should dream that they alone encompass bliss. 

When 'tis but fitful, phosphorescent flame 
To soul-exalting planet-ray like this ! 

O vision fair of oneness with the Whole ! 
In thee alone is blessedness and truth. 



MISCELLANEOUS 105 

Insight and strength are thy sweet gifts, O Soul, 
And lofty promise of eternal youth. 

Give me to rove in the supremer air ! 

Give me the mountain-side to toil and climb ! 
I shall breathe easier and freer there, 

I shall die calmer on those heights sublime. 



LIFE'S BEAUTY 

Oh, when often in my bosom 

Glows a longing for life's beauty, 

Something in me whispers, — urging, - 
" 'T is incentive to life's duty ! 
'Tis high impetus to duty." 

And I know the voice speaks truly. 
For high peace finds never mortal 

Save in strong, sublime endeavor 
Worshipful at Duty's portal ; 

Steadfast, meek, at Duty's portal. 

Flame, then, in my bosom, Beauty ! 

Flame and glow with fire supernal. 
Thou shalt lead me — willing go I ! — 

To life's blessedness eternal. 
Unto joys ideal, eternal. 



io6 POEMS OF LIVING 



WORK 

To seek — invent — discover ! To create ! 
Mountains to carve, wild zones to subjugate, 
The seas to merge, rude metals to refine, 
Harsh sounds to mingle in mellifluous line. 
Disease to vanquish, famine to repel, 
World-thought to lift, and peal Wrong's passing- 
bell ; — 
The daily toil of common mill and mart, 
The humblest toil, if mixed with thought and heart, ■ 
Lo, 't is man's Angel ! 't is the life of life ! 
Pain fails of power, and strife no more is strife. 
Swiftly flies doubt, and grieving follows fast. 
Blown on the wings of this supernal blast. 

What art thou. Labor ? Nay, what art thou not ! 
For world's unkindness, soul's sweet garden-spot ; 
Shade if detraction's scorching airs arise ; 
Sun to illume fear's direful fantasies ; 
Lover to give the spirit pure caress ; 
Friend to dispel bereavement's loneliness ; 
Quencher of wants if poverty befall ; 
Narcotic draft for pain tyrannical ; 
Disdained affection's Lethe; — magic wand 
To waft us swiftly, soothingly, beyond 
Earth's every selfishness and meanness dire, 
And bathe the soul in Heaven's own blissful 'fire ! 



MISCELLANEOUS 107 

Do Nature's forces ever idle lurk ? 
Doth she, the Mighty One, not ceaseless work 
To-day as when at her evolving call 
From chaos tow'rd perfection sprang earth's ball ? 
So toil ye also, hands, heart, mind of me ! — 
Till latest hour strive on in ecstasy ! 
Strive on ? Yea, love on ! — toil and love are one 
To him who toils nor wishes toilings done. 
Did erst the morning stars with rapture sing ? 
Is 't writ, with peace Heaven's echoing arches ring ? 
So human souls, through their most secret aisles. 
When Labor, baffling weakness, soars and smiles. 



CONFESSIONS OF A VOLUPTUARY 

[1903] 



Voluptuary, I ! At dawn's first flash, 

While wretched thousands are condemned to sleep, 
I rise and in luxurious coolness splash, — 

Then on my silent courser joyous leap 
To seek the hilltop or the woodland stream, 
Or watch the lighthouse as it pales its beam. 

The robin and the bobolink and I 

Have kindred passion for the morning sky. 



io8 POEMS OF LIVING 



While others drudge at kitchen board or fire, 

Compelled for breakfast's needs to broil or brew, 

I talk with novelists who never tire. 
Or wing with poets the ethereal blue. 

I 'd rather bathe my soul than pots and plates, — 

Would barter Wedgwood for a bag of dates : 
For I have learned that simplest fare is best. 
And nuts and fruits make mealtime-seasons blest. 

(Forgive me, flocks and herds, — sweet-breath'd as 
Ind,— 

That range the prairie and the pasture deep ! 
Forgive me that in ignorance I sinned : 

That you were once my sacrifice I weep. 
Besides, men learn that they find healthier blood 
In pulse than flesh, in figs than carnal flood. 

The soul sincere that seeks mind's regions fair 

Loves fragrant foods that bloom in sun and air.) 

Ill 
When toil begins, and comrades fret and shirk, 

I freshen labor with the spirit's test. 
Imagination never hindered work. 

In perfect product is completest rest. 
I take my pleasure as I go along. 
And try to make my daily toil my song. 

Through half a hemisphere or half a mile 

The load pulls easiest harnessed with a smile. 



MISCELLANEOUS 109 



IV 

At evening's hour, when others haste to dress, 
Condemned to theatre or fashion's whirl, 

I sit and give my daughter a caress, 

Or in the wine of thought dissolve a pearl. 

The pearl is often art's or history's page. 

Which thought — on-leading to a Golden Age — 
Would fain transmute into such Path of Fate 
As blind might follow to Elysian Gate. 

A Golden Age ? I'm in it even now ! 

For, wanting little, I have some for others. 
(If any, hungry, at my feast would bow. 

My morn or evening's richness is my brother's ! ) 
My fond desire is that the world may see 
Earth gives enough for all humanity. 

Men only need a willingness to share. 

And all the world would breathe ambrosial air. 



'T is true I little have of what men prize. 

And often (like the saints) wear shining garb ; 

But having mirthfulness and open eyes 
I bind with velvet life's metallic barb, — 

Holding contentment, though in wooden walls. 

Better than selfishness in tinseled halls. 
While earth's rich Saturnalia still is mine 
I shall not fail of spirit's oil and wine. 



no POEMS OF LIVING 

I would not change my modest daily lot 

For any wealth that brought with it a care : 

I love my ease too well to wish to blot 
My freedom of the sky and sea and air. 

I sink myself in soul and sense each day, 

And in voluptuous shamelessness grow gray. 

Nay ! — sink myself in joy each hour that's rung, 
And grow each year voluptuously young. 



THE LAUGHING PHILOSOPHER 

[Read on a " Holmes night " — 1891] 

Oh, not do saints and bards alone 

Who chant the high, the solemn verse, 

And counsel but in serious tone, 
Help on the better from the worse. 

Full oft the lighter, gayer song. 
The sparkle and the flash of wit. 

Which gurgle, gush, and float along 
And in and out and yonder flit, — 

Not knowing quite what shore they reach, 
What capes they pass, what gleaming strand, 

Nor deem that they a gospel preach, — 
May also guide to Happier Land. 



MISCELLANEOUS in 

Such song is his — our Bard to-night ! 

His verses ripple, gurgle, gush, 
Yet bear us with a magic might, 

With here a lag, and there a rush. 

To where we see that lofty deed 
Doth Life of the Divine disburse, 

As every dewdrop on the mead 
Reveals the rounded universe. 

I saw him once — this poet gay — 

Beside a window in the street : 
What potent presence there that day 

Could hold so fine a poet's feet ? 

I saw his face one beaming smile — 
Intense enjoyment gleamed and shone. 

Two mimic dogs, on wires, the while, 
Were tugging at a mimic bone ! 

He turned — eyes met; — he smiled the more. 

"Best thing I've seen," said he (and bowed), 
" Since last I by the Common's door 

Heard Punch and Judy clamor loud." 

Ah, well ! As the odd scene we spurned, 
" Life 's seldom harmed," said he, " by fun. 

I like the apples southward turned ; 
They ripen mellowest in the sun." 



112 POEMS OF LIVING 

Like Holmes, I too am still a child. 

I love my baby's simplest toys ; 
Can dance or blow the whistle wild 

With any dozen girls or boys. 

And deepest thought nor highest hope 
Is hindered by such moment's dash. 

I 'm helped by sunshine, when I grope, 
Far more than by the lightning's flash. 

No less, the High we need to spell ! " 
The loftiest shown is none too far ! 

Holmes — yes ! but Emerson as well, 
To hitch our wagon to a star. 

We need to join the two in one, 
The happy and the serious air. 

Ah, what of good might not be done 
By progeny of such a pair ! 

The age demands a nobler race 

Than habits now this whirling Ball : 

Be ours the Problem Vast to face. 
Be ours to answer to the Call. 



MISCELLANEOUS 113 



INWARD FIRES 

My heart would sing for joy ! 

A friendly hand is reached 
And lights earth's dull annoy ! 
Kindness is at me flung 
Better than song e'er sung 

Or sermon ever preached. 

'T is not the gift I prize : 

It is the heart behind. 
O men and women ! rise 
To understand how more 
Is love than golden ore ! 

Too long men's souls are blind. 

With nobleness meet all ! 

Thou hast undreamed return 
In lifting feet that fall, 
In rescuing the faint. 
No artist hand can paint 

The fires that inward burn. 

And inward fires alone 

Are those that warm us long. 
Nought outward can atone 
For sinking in the sea 
Love's opportunity ! . . . 

Thus sings my heart its song. 



114 POEMS OF LIVING 



SAGE AND CLOWN 

I saw two men as I walked up town : 

One a " sage," men said, — and the other a " down." 



The sage had just come from the halls of debate, 
Where his " wisdom and courage " had " saved the 

State." 
Yet I saw him just now, with self-confident grin. 
At doors where true wisdom and strength ne'er 

go in. 
The crowd at his heels was surging thick. 
And he, in his pride, with a gold-headed stick. 
Was reviewing again, with much flourish in air. 
How well he had " captured the senators " there. 
"And they voted at last," said this keen politician, 
•' Not according to theirs, but to my volition ! 
I ever can vanquish the men who ' think ' ! " — 
And then he moved inward to " take a drink "; 
And, stumbling in turning, he tripped o'er a child. 
And greeted him harshly, with threatenings wild. 

This, one of the men whom I saw up town : 
With "the brain of a sage" — and the heart of a 
clown. 



MISCELLANEOUS 115 



II 

Quick struggling forward, with look of alarm, 
Then saw I the other, just come from his farm. 
That a man thus rude to a child could be, 
From his cheek drove his soul's calm ecstasy. 
His brow wore a frown such as one before 
Must have worn who the sorrows of many bore 
While helpless the harshness of men to retrieve : 
Yet his eyes'- light was love, as when angels grieve. 
The babe he uplifted from where he lay crushed. 
And with words of endearment his sobbings hushed. 
In his strong arms tenderly bore he the child, 
And pointed where high, golden clouds were piled. 
And bade him hear bird-songs in yonder trees 
And list to the croon in the springtime breeze. 

This, the other of two whom these rhymings would 

gauge : 
With "the brain of a clown" — and the heart of a 

sage. 



ii6 POEMS OF LIVING 



THREE QUATRAINS 

I 

Self-Illumined 

What if the sun be darkened ? 

Eyes shall be hopeful still ! 
Souls in themselves are torches 

And light what realms they will. 

II 
Words and Deeds 

Words ! ah, words ! 'Tis easy writing 
Of the ardor men should feel : 

But 'tis harder, Paris, smiting 
Armed Achilles in the heel. 

Ill 
The Devil of Drink 

Of all the devils in time or space, 
The devil that has the smallest grace 
Is the devil that steals away man's wit 
And leaves him but shame in place of it. 



MISCELLANEOUS 117 



DREAM -COUNSEL 

[1890] 

I dreamed of you, last night, 

Brother and friend, — 
And all the sky was light 

And without end ! 
With wisdom you were fraught, 

Companion mine ; 
And, joyous, I was taught 

In things divine. 

I came to you in care. 

From wearying mart : 
We parted light as air, 

And glad of heart. 
Where disappointment's pain 

Had weighed me low, 
You changed the evening rain 

To sunrise-glow. 

Where I — because my strife 

For Truth and Day 
Seemed fruitless, and my Ufa 

But thrown away — 
Was downcast and in tears. 

With cheering voice 
You banished all my fears. 

And cried " Rejoice ! 



ii8 POEMS OF LIVING 

" Rejoice ! it is the quest, 

'Tis not the art 
Of gaining ends that best 

Fulfils life's part. 
What though for thee the rain, 

The briar and burr ? 
Oh, surely not in vain 

Thy strugglings were. 

" Through years thy aim, thy call. 
Has been for things 
Exalted over all 

That * Comfort ' sings. 
' Truth,' * Duty,' ' Good,' thy words, 

And ' Boldness ' too, 
Beyond what common herds 
Yet ever knew. 

" In peace, then, sleep, this night, 

O troubled heart ! 
Though low, yet is thy plight 

The better part. 
And when at last immured 

In earth for rest, 
Thy soul shall be assured 

The strife was best." 

So spake you to me, friend, 

Within my dream. 
Showing the nobler end 

To be, not seem. 



MISCELLANEOUS 119 

Content, then, I, to dare, 

Without success ! 
Though poverty my share, 

I 've blessedness. 



CYPRESS - CROWNED 

To-day the winds of March are wild. 
The swallows huddle 'neath the shore ; 
Their wings are still — they cannot fly. 
But yonder, whirled about the sky, 
The gulls are circling, o'er and o'er : 
The gull is Ocean's passive child. 

The winds of Fate adversely blow. 
My friends and fellows do not sing ; 
They sing but when the waves are calm. 
I look not always for the palm, 
I take what laurels Fate may bring : 
With cypress crowned at times I go. 



I20 POEMS OF LIVING 



FORELOOKING 

[College Hill, Midsummer, 1879] 

I sit beside my window here 
. And greet the breaking day. 
The air is calm, the sky is clear, 
And yonder shines the Bay ! 

Along the silvery rim of light 
Which marks the ocean's edge. 

Fair far-off slanting wings of white 
Sail slow beyond the ledge. 

Beyond the ledge of towering rocks 
Which mark the heights of Lynn, 

They sail to where the Equinox 
Shall howl with awful din ! 

Oh stay at home, ye stately ships ! 

Oh stay at home as I, 
Nor sail to meet but sure eclipse 

Beneath an angry sky ! 

The wandering thought, the impatient heart, 

The discontented soul, 
At best can know of life but part, 

And not the rounded whole. 



MISCELLANEOUS 121 

But ah ! ye cannot stay ! — e'en now 

Your sails are seaward set : 
E'en now above your burdened bow 

The fluttering sea-gulls fret. 

And soon I too must hence away, 

To skirt uncharted shores ! 
Already in my ears the spray 

Of ocean conflict roars. 

'T is well ! 't is well, ye stately ships ! 

Ye were not made for calm ! 
Your keels were laid to bear to lips 

That hunger. Eastern balm. 

'T is well no port of listless peace 

Enshields your slothful sail : 
The ship that gains the Golden Fleece 

Must dare the Euxine gale. 

'T is well, O heart, no life of ease 

Before thee opens fair ! 
That perfect life would fail to please 

Which breathed but softer air. 

'T is not when zephyrs kindly blow, 

And calmly, sweetly steal ; 
When waters musically flow. 

And laugh along the keel ; 



122 POEMS OF LIVING 

'T is in the dashing of life's wave, 

And in the sudden shock ; 
'T is when the soul, though stout and brave, 

Is ground as on the rock. 

That life's objective port is neared, 

Its noblest courses run, 
And souls of men the straightest steered 

To Isles of Inward Sun. 



ZEAL 

To Be ! To Do ! To have the zeal to climb 
O'er all the shocks of Fate to zones sublime ! 
To know that Time's successes, — praise and blame, 
Are transient fires however fierce they flame ; 
That soon and late are equal, — death and birth, — 
And love's sweet dominance alone of worth. 
That toil and struggle and pain's agony 
Are nothing if the inner eye but see ! 
To realize, though cumbered in earth's ooze. 
That there are heights with ever vaster views 
To which the soul is hasting, freed from strife ! — 
This is the spirit's pole-star — this is life. 



MISCELLANEOUS 123 



THROUGH THE SUNSET SEA 

[From College Hill] 

The day is done : 

The imperial Sun 

Is sinking, now his course is run, 

Behind the hills of Arlington. 

Through purple mist 

I view the tryst 

The sunbeams keep with the clouds they kissed 

While descending the Vale of Amethyst. 

Through amber haze 

I view the blaze 

Forth streaming in red level rays 

Over hillside paths and forest ways. 

As Moses' rod, 
In the Story of God, 
Was lifted where the Israelites trod, 
That through watery walls they might walk dry 
shod, — 

So the Sun's last blaze. 

These autumn days, 

Its rod of lurid enchantment lays 

Where the Mystic's crimson current plays ! . . . 



124 POEMS OF LIVING 

O people of old ! 

Into Egypt sold, 

Ye there, as the Wonder Book has told, 

Were oppressed till your hearts in dust were rolled ! 

Yet ye did not despair, 

But from Pharaoh's snare 

Escaped by the Red Sea beach laid bare, 

Into Canaan's fertile, kindlier air, 

O sunset glow 

On the river below. 

Where I watch the shadows swerve and grow, — 

Your secret message I seem to know ! 

As I gaze and dream, 

Your waters seem 

To part like that ancient fabled stream ; — 

Life's hungers are ever the same and supreme ! 

Each heart — like the Jews — 

To be led would choose 

From a land where doubts and fears abuse, 

To a land where faith all fear subdues. 

The prizes are mean 

That intervene : 

Be sundered ! divided ! O vapory screen ! 

And give us to walk unscathed between. 



MISCELLANEOUS 125 



AFTER A WEEK WITH A WOOD- 
CHOPPER 

[Winchendon, Massachusetts, August, 1890] 

Ah ! in this wilding solitude 
'Tis easy to believe in good ! 

Brother, you better knew than I — 
Happy whose roof is but the sky ! 
'Tis truth, what Homer, Bryant, sang — 
The groves to God with praise first rang. 
You call me from the city's din 
In pity for my fight with "sin," 
Asking if what to God I owe 
I can pay better than with hoe ! 

Bismillah ! have I so mistook ? 
Flee " platform " for a pruning-hook ? 
Yet haply you 're not far astray ! 
Here ! I will help you rake your hay, — 
Watching, as from your stony walls 
The frisking chipmunk gayly calls ; 
Heark'ning, delighted, as the breeze 
Chants through your oak and chestnut trees, — 



126 POEMS OF LIVING 

While off Monadnock's towering sides, 
Into my heart, deep calmness slides. 

'T is truth, what ancient poets tell ; 
Moses and Jesus worshiped well : 
In rose-illumined bush the first, 
The other where the lily burst. 
And joyance in the fields, ev'n yet, 
May better help man pay " God's debt " 
Than toiling in the city's waste 
With New Philosophy and paste, 
Patching mankind afresh each hour 
With Social Science's wet flour. 

In woodland deep, with axe or hoe, 
The breath of health and peace we know ; 
While only cark and thankless care 
Are found in the uneasy air 
Where metaphysics swells in dykes. 
Leaks endlessly, but seldom strikes 
Into the current fresh and real 
Suggested by man's New Ideal. 

Happy the man whose wants are few, 
And ever met, however new, 
By the deep, ample stores that hide 
In Nature's simple woodland-side. 
Wretched, alas ! who constant delve 
Only their souls to bind and shelve ; 



MISCELLANEOUS 127 

While wealthy they, though low their rank, 

For whom sleep moonbeams on some bank. 

For them no surer " bank " can be. 

Nor richer with prosperity ; 

For, kneeling by the stream and sod, 

At least they may be sure of God. 



AT THE SUMMIT 

All wearied in the search for truth. 
Nor ever nearer to the goal, 
I turn the magnet from the Pole 

And laugh once more as loud as youth. 

O human heart ! insatiate 

To solve the secret of thy birth 

And know thou shalt survive the earth ! 

Though centuries still baffled wait ! 

Enfranchised from the vain pursuit 
I greet with joy each breaking day. 
And when the sunset fades in gray 

Make melody with voice and lute. 

At least I live and love, this hour ! 
And meadow, sea, and sky are fair. 



128 POEMS OF LIVING 

And fellow-workers everywhere 
Are battling for man's larger dower. 

Man's energies with Earth's keep time ; 

High human needs must still be met ; 

And simplest task, to duty set, 
Is evermore a deed sublime. 

So, hoping, singing, toiling on, 
I waive pursuit of skyey birth, 
To smooth rough pathways of the earth 

Where feet must tread when I am gone. 



POEMS OF LIVING 

//. SONNETS 



TO PRIZE LIFE'S HARDNESS 

To prize life's hardness ! find delight in ways 
That scale the hill-crest and the loftier air ; 
To rouse some bird-song in the desolate days 
When winter holds the forest frozen and bare ; 

To wear the cypress as though laurel-wreathed ; 
To lure a smile from brows that darkly frown ; 
To say to traits of evil, age-bequeathed, 
"Ye may be blotted out ! " — and fight them down. 

To take what Heaven or Circumstance has sent 
And bend it to the making of a man ! — 
This is the aim whereto my days are blent, 
My fond endeavor, waking vision, plan. 

O life ! O earth ! I prize you for your smart, 

And for your rudeness I am glad at heart. 



129 



I30 POEMS OF LIVING 



HOW SING'ST THOU, THEN? 

The daily round of life — man's broken faith, 
The shock of accident, pain's bitter smart. 
Love's hunger, disappointment's mocking wraith. 
Bereavement's anguish, sudden passion's dart — 

O hopeful soul of mine ! the daily round 
Of life for thee is no less hard and black 
Than other mortals in their passage sound : 
How sing'st thou, then, — so often on the rack ! 

And soul makes answer : Would it help my state 
To hail Despair ? to curse ? or knock the breast ? 
Nay ! but a song will direst ill abate. 
And bring the burdened heart unbounded rest. 

Each threatening ill I boldly turn to greet, 

And drown its discord in my music sweet. 



JOY IN ONE'S WORK 

If in thy daily toil thou hast not joy, 
Oh study to attain some happier way ! 
So few life's needs, why languish and grow gray 
At tasks which serve thee but for soul's annoy ! 

If work be play, no questioning alloy 

Of " high " or " low " need desecrate thy day ; 
The roof as grandly rear, the furrow lay. 
As carve a statue for a nation's toy ! 



SONNETS 131 

But make thy moil a ministry of glee — 

Of zeal, and mind's delight, and heart's repose, 
Obedient to the Voice that lures from sadness. 

No slave's mean service Nature asks of thee, 
But spirit's blossoming to leaf and rose. 
And fragrance making night and day a gladness. 



THE MAN ON THE MOUNTAIN 

When to the mountain of enfranchised soul 
I came at length, and scanned its sunlit way. 
No longer might I, like a child at play, 
Rove listless where life's garden foot-hills roll. 

Yet peak on peak so towered that pathless Whole, 
It seemed some loftier power must with me stray. 
And brace my heart, and be my strength and stay, 
If ever I should gain that longed-for goal. 

Then just above me I beheld a man 

Whose face was luminous as morning sky. 
Whose brow was freed from every earthly ban, 
Whose arms outstretched allured me wistful nigh. 

" Come up," he said, "and dare these heights with me ; 

I am the nobler man you yet shall be." 



132 POEMS OF LIVING 



HOURS OF INSIGHT 

How blest am I that often in my dreams 

Come lofty thoughts to waking hours unknown ! 

Airs as of mountain-tops are round me blown, 

And soul upflames with more than sunrise-beams. 
Imagination circles ; insight gleams 

Unwontedly, with love and purpose sown ; 

And spirit's blossoms - — in Elysium grown — 

Allure my heart along unfailing streams. 
O waking hours with pains and passions filled ; 

Poor human strivings for the things that pass ! 

Rise, soul, above them, to serener heights ; 
Thy dreams forthshadow life's high goal, if willed 

And followed ! Soon Night's visions fade, alas ! 

But Day's high conquests offer long delights. 



MY FEATHERED PREACHER 

All day my maples in the blast have bowed ; 

The sleet howls lustily through shivering limbs ; 
Yet e'en though ice the creaking branches rims. 
There with high hardihood he hovereth proud — 

Busy and bustling ! Full and sweet and loud 
His warbling cheer the wintry whistling dims. 
Earth's crystal bowl with song he overbrims, 
Making an altar of its snowy shroud. 



SONNETS 133 

Soul of my soul ! for secret, sheltered nook 
Must thou forever pray when blasts are nigh 
And howling passions, seeking thee, stream by ? 
Nay, O my soul, in the gale's teeth dare look ! 
Still fighting, sing ! lift undismayed thy din : 
Only undaunted hearts scale heaven and win. 



IDEAL BEAUTY 

Ideal Beauty ! — seers' exhaustless theme 

Which hath absorbed their eager spirits quite ! 
Not beauties merely — of the lustrous night 
And iridescent day ; but loftier dream — 

Beauty embracing beauties. Fair the gleam 
Of earliest dawn ; a purifying sight 
The heavens all diamonded : but more that Light — 
The heavens' Heaven — of worlds and souls the 
Beam. 

O radiant hill-tops ! unto you mine eyes ! 
O budding violets ! all my sense ye thrall ! 
O human comrades ! heart of me ye thrill ! 

But Beauty uncreate in earth or skies. 

Eternal and divine, — soul's ceaseless call, — 
To thee my prayer, my passion, and my will ! 



134 POEMS OF LIVING 



THE PATH 



Shall I not bear my portion of life's pain, — 
Of mind, — of body, — and withhold all cry ? 
Life hath evolved through pain. The studious eye 
Finds here the path of Being's highest gain. 

Earth's agonies have been earth's bliss, not bane. 
Then spring the torture, if I grow thereby, 
Or so the hope of myriads doth not die 
And nobler blessedness on earth have reign ! 

Many have been whose flesh hath hailed the torch. 
Whose souls have welcomed contumely's ban, 
Devoutly chanting Freedom's songs the while. 

Making the gates of martyrdom a porch 

To highest Heaven — the growing good of Man ! 
Shall I not also bear, and, bearing, smile ? 

II 

The Path ! The Path ! It has been one of pain, 
But must it be so always ? Must the rise 
Of men and nations tow'rds the spirit's skies 
Be ever only under Sorrow's reign .-* 

Shall not Man's growing insight yet attain 
A thornless pathway up to Being's prize. 
And Soul's revealing airs anoint Man's eyes 
Till pangless harmony with Good lies plain ? 



SONNETS 135 

O happy Age, when Ignorance lies dead, 

When Want and Greed have fled their noisome 

place, 
And Passion, thought-redeemed, seeks heights 
above ! 
In this sweet Path, O Earth, thy sons be led, 

Till pain's long rule shall pass, and strength and 

grace 
Be won through sight of Beauty and through Love. 



THE VICTOR' 

So calmly, quietly he walked, that men. 
Unless they knew the inward of his days, 
Might feel that he was born for naught but praise, 
And that the native sunlight tipt his pen. 

But in his path the lion had his den, 

And strangling serpents hissed along his ways ; 
Early and late the woodland was ablaze 
For him who loved the coolness of the fen. 

O Strongheart ! not in vain you bore the strife ! 
The lion and the serpent at your word 
Crouched harmless and the flames died impotent. 

We who know all are braver for your life. 

And daily, since your summons we have heard. 
Shall bear more nobly, walk more reverent. 

'Written of Henry M. Simmons (1841-1905), author of "The 
Unending Genesis " and " New Tables of Stone." 



136 POEMS OF LIVING 



SPIRALS 

Daily we mount them all, from Pit to Dome ! 

Not Dante's circling choirs, nor Raphael's, 

Nor all the inmates of all heavens and hells 

In fantasies of Asia, Egypt, Rome, 
Surpass the hordes that make each soul their home. 

The clank of chains, the chime of silvery bells — 

Shame, Passion, Song — in turn each sinks and 
swells : 

Now faith soars high, now all seems froth and foam. 
O fateful circle where I most part fare. 

Dim Middle Region, — Purgatorial fog, — 

Oppressed by equal hopefulness and doubt ! 
At times I fain would wing through clearer air. 

Yet joyful move I, mindless of each clog, 

On to what end Eternity works out. 



HEART'S TREASURES 

On winter meadow once, a little child 
In digging 'neath the snow as fancy led 
Unroofed a tiny streamlet's frozen bed — 
Then danced at treasures there, in joyance wild 

Rare icy arabesques, rich gems up-piled — 
Encrystaled wonders ! But his bosom bled. 
And sore he wept, as day grew warm o'erhead, 
To see them vanish in the radiance mild ! 



SONNETS 137 

That child of old — long since he grew a man ; 

But ne'er has season flown — fall, winter, spring — 
That magic streams have not heart's treasures 
dealt : 
Sweet friends, dear children ; power to dream and 
plan ; 
The earth's fresh face ; and — yea ! — the faith to 

sing 
Instead of weep when life's dear joys swift melt. 



AND LAST OF ALL I LEARN IT 

And last of all I learn it ! Yea, O soul. 

Have patience not alone with those around — 
Poor will-less beings sin and habit bound : 
With wealth that offers but a piteous dole 

Though earth's faint children pant for happier goal ; 
With statesmen paltering on patriot ground ; 
With churchmen silent though God's trumpets 

sound : 
With all who fail of nearer perfect whole ! 

Have patience also — full, serene, and free, 
Lasting and deep, and with as gracious part 
As that thou showest every wayward elf — 

When thou hast failed to grandly do and be. 
And failing, feelest sorrow at thy heart. 
Have patience, oh, have patience with — thyself. 



138 POEMS OF LIVING 



FOILS 



"I am the master of my fate," one says, 
And adds, " I am the captain of my soul." 
Bravely a man rehearsed these words, in days 
When he was young and fortunate and whole. 

From virtuous ancestry his blood was calm ; 

Sisters and brothers — friends — were his a store ; 
Thorns were afar from him, and pine and palm 
Fragrantly breathed for him on summer shore. 

Fate took his wealth ; a sister died in shame : 
Honor he scoffed at when his pride was bled. 
One loved him still, and would have borne his name, 
But while she donned the orange-blooms he fled. 

A new face shone while pealed his marriage-bell : 

It beckoned — and he followed it to hell. 



II 

"Why should I strive ? What boon can I attain 
Fate had conditioned me ere I was born ! " 
Such were the manacles of damning pain 
Another life from earliest years had worn. 

His mother was a woman of the street, 

His " father " — she nor he had ever known ; 
The alleys were his nursery ; and sweet 
To him, as to a dog, a wayside bone. 



SONNETS 139 

His country called — ah, here was chance to die ! • 
He flew on savage wings and met the foe. 
His victory gave him courage, and his eye 
Sparkled with hope the noble only know. 

Back to the world he came, and toiled elate, 

And died an honored Minister of State. 



PLATITUDES 

The froth of pleasure quickly sinks to lees, 

Its taste soon brackish on the dullest tongue. 

Only the highest strife brings highest ease ; 

From self alone is selfhood's victory wrung. 
In every prophet-path rude crosses lift, 

And nails are ready upon every hand ; 

Spear-heads and vinegar are all earth's gift, 

And quarreling the hooting rabble stand. 
Who seek for blessedness need only drink ; 

Want much, you thirst, however fast you pour. 

Seek peace, all heaven is yours before you think ; 

All that makes hell you knew full well before. 
Out on such cursed platitudes ! but, — mark, — 
The truth they hold makes Being bright or dark. 



140 POEMS OF LIVING 



NOON IN THE PRINTING-SHOP 

'T is noontide. For an hour the workers rest 
Amid the quiet where but now there rang 
The fugue of type and planer, presses' clang, 
And all the concords of the printer's quest. 

Around me suddenly, in beauty drest. 

Rise forest aisles ! The notes of birds that sang 
Long past, again I hear ; the wild fruit's tang 
Again I taste, in dewy coverts blest. 

Imagination ! power hast thou to take 
From toil its sting, and unto age impart 
The vanished fire of youth's first morning-glow ! 

Happy who learn thy simple law, and slake 
Through charm of inner eye and loving heart 
Earth's direst griefs in mind's rich overflow. 



TRUE LIFE OF US 

True life of us, where art thou hid away ! 
This ceaseless moiling in the shop and mart. 
This thoughtless social mocking of the heart. 
Which all-absorb our waking, year and day. 

Cannot be life ! At times at evening-gray — 
Faint symbol of night's solveless counterpart 
Which dimly waits — from drowsiness we start, 
So fair the dream that comes, and cry, " Oh, stay ! 



SONNETS 141 

Perchance we first time really see a flower ! 

Some inward grandeur — un suspect — makes cry ! 

Or others' nobleness enchains our view ! 
In such informing and exalting hour 

Earth's old futilities pass downcast by, 

And life on sudden takes eternal hue. 



THE NAMELESS RECORD 

In Rome a chiseled marble told a tale 
Of noble deeds and high unselfish life — 
Though from the tablet hammer-blows and knife 
Had all obliterated, as with hail. 

The great one's name ! Old centuries wan and pale 
Which met blood's Nemesis in awful strife 
Of Goths and Vandals — years with horror rife — 
Beheld it, and it weighed them in its scale 

And found them wanting. For not Pompey's name, 
Nor Caesar's, ever filled this space with fear, 
But hero's crowned with more than monarch's bays : 

Some Greatheart's, blotting here his sculptured fame, 
As knowing lives of selflessness austere 
Are lived from love of love, not love of praise ! 



142 POEMS OF LIVING 



A'; RADIANT YOUTH I KNEW 

I 

A radiant youth I knew. His glowing face 
Was like a blushing rose of dawn's own tints ; 
It scarcely seemed he ought to dare life's race 
Where coarser feet plowed deep their heedless 
prints. 

I loved him for his nobleness, and tried 

To dream his coming great career for Man. 
"O Fate ! remove all obstacles," I cried, 
"And in his path uprear no evil ban." 

But tempters came — one temptress most of all, 
Who kissed his lips and hung upon his neck, 
And lured him to her worship — sweet to gall — 
Till on life's shore he lay a battered wreck. 

On crags Caucasian, vultures no more spare 

A bound Prometheus than a blundering hare. 

II 

Yet "all things work for good " ! O Knowledge bold, 
'Tis thus to-day with no less cheering tone 
You speak than saint or prophet spake of old, 
Soft lustre flashing through our weeping zone. 

My noble one lies dead in godlike youth ! 

Such powers as his had rescued half a world ! 
And yet I must not doubt : 't is surely truth 
That naught in Nature to the Void is hurled. 



SONNETS 143 

Himself he could not save — will he save others ? 
His sacrifice — will it have aught of force ? 
While yet he lies unhearsed, among his brothers 
A myriad boldly venture the same course ! . . . 
A few — beweeping self — may pause an hour, 
And on his coffin fling — like me — -a flower. 



SELF-MADE CROSSES 

After the palm and cheer — the scoff and cross ! 
But his were love and innocence who bore. 
Ah ! what of those, the wilful, 'mid the roar 
Of pitiless ills that mark their pain and loss ! 

Sinning, transgressing, they seem to wear the crown ; 
Joyous they laugh, and dream "'Tis victory." 
Ah ! but the awful sequence of their glee 
Drags them and strips them, fainting, shuddering, 
down. 

There — the world's helper, pierced by scorners who 
With evil hands uplifted him, the pure : 
Here — the maimed throng whose mangled lives 

endure 
Only the nails themselves drove thoughtless 
through. 

Ah, even than that Central Scaffold drear, 

Sadder the crosses for ourselves we rear ! 



144 POEMS OF LIVING 



CAUSATION 

She played, an innocent darling, 'mid the flowers ; 
Hid ivy foully poisoned her. She sang, 
A child, on forest edge, — till suddenly rang 
Her agony from bee-stings 'mid the bowers. 

Grown to fair maidhood, golden were her hours ! 
Love beatific, holy, filled her breast. 
No Angel warned her — why reveal the rest ? 
Above her wave-lapt corse no marble towers. 

Happy and prosperous one, by Fortune crowned ! 
Thee doth thy " virtue " keep .'' And was it " sin 
That wrecked her of her all ? Nay, world, begin 
More wisely Nature's secret depths to sound. 

Man needs a knowledge not yet taught in schools. 

Seek out yet more her laws. Causation rules. 



HEREDITY 

Avaunt, ye myriad ancestors of mine 

Whose olden deeds persist and hinder me ! 
No longer I accept your sov^ereignty ; 
In sole autocracy I rise and shine. 

If ye were buccaneers, I will incline 
To acts that shall redeem your perfidy ; 
If ye perchance were tyrants, I will be 
To all my fellows helpful and benign. 



SONNETS 145 

In whatsoever ye were base or sad, 

I flout and overcome you one and all 

And rear henceforth a standard fair and high. . . . 
Yet whence, O Sires, received I good with bad ! — 

To what staunch soul, I wonder, am I thrall 

In thus determining I will be I ! 



SELF - GRATULATION 

When I consider all my path of life — 

The slight estate wherewith my years began ; 

The baffling but indomitable strife 

To mould from crumbling clay a lofty man ; 

When I recall the goblins of the soul 

Which hoary Credence fastened on my youth — 

The Past's rude superstitions taking toll 

Of ardent years which else had served the Truth ; 

When still, in memory, I front the wall 

With which Convention blocked my hopeful way, 

And feel again, as at the earlier call. 

The smart of strokes in Freedom's holy fray — 

I marvel at the unattained no more. 

But at the much, though little, of my store. 



146 POEMS OF LIVING 



ACROSS THE LINE: AT FIFTY 

Into the river of my life still flow 

Streams of delight from youth's unfailing springs ; 

By every flower that blows and bird that sings 

My heart is thrilled as in the long ago. 
All aspirations youthful dreamers know — 

For Man — for self ! the joy that service brings ; 

Faith without folly ; honors void of stings : 

These quenchless orbs still keep my skies aglow. 
Mine also the amazement of the child 

At War's persistent shame — earth's sorrow old ; 

And at men's strife to hoard, who need but bread. 
O rills of blessedness divinely mild, 

Into my being's tide perpetual rolled ! 

From your sweet founts no stain, no grief, I dread. 



SONNETS 147 



ULTIMA THULE 

Now cease to toil ? Nay, this for me not yet, 
Thou youth who deemest growing age a bar 
That hinders sight of new-ascendant star 
And dulls heroic zeal to soft regret. 

High failure or high conquest doth but whet. 
For noble souls, the will to climb afar 
Where splendors of all fine endeavors are — 
Transcendent orbs which, rising, never set ! 

Then pity not, dear youth, the growing gray 

Which threatens me — no gray afflicts the soul ! 
No vision yet of Utmost Isle is mine — 

Nor ever shall be ! for the sacred day 

Will come unomened when I reach the goal ; 
My last step only shall attain the shrine. 



148 POEMS OF LIVING 



THE LOVELIEST ANGEL 

Time was — Time is. Our choice when years were 
young 

Was Michael — he of flaming sword and brow, 

Whose brandished blade, and high, imperious 
" Now ! " 

Submission's cry from recreant Error wrung. 
Then thralled was soul by songs high bards have 
sung. 

And Gabriel, God's courier to endow 

The earth with Knowledge, chose we, seeking how 

To lift mankind to Heaven with luring tongue. 
Now night advances : strife and teaching cease. 

Ascends the star of dreams when day is done ! 

Of all the Angels, choose we Azrael ! 
His name is symbol of a longed-for peace : 

Not hooded is his face, but like the sun, 

And in his hand the immortal asphodel. 



POEMS OF NATURE 

/. MISCELLANEOUS 



IN TREETOP LAND 

I see you, robin, on your perch 
High up amid the maple there. 
What hall of music, couch of ease. 
Not built by hands, soft rocked by breeze, 
Could earth show fairer to my search 
Than swaying hammock in the air, 

In Treetop Land ! 
Unmindful of the hoarding strife 
Which sums the sum of human life. 
Ten cherries are enough for you : 
You only ask a plum or two — 
And Treetop Land. 

The sunshine streams at break of day 
And through your leafy lattice weaves. 
The liquid air invites your wing — 
What wonder that you sing and sing ! 
Your busiest toil is busiest play ; 
No envy your existence grieves 
In Treetop Land. 
149 



ISO POEMS OF NATURE 

A prayer I breathe — an eager cry ! 
'* O Mother Nature, till I die 

Dear hours and days vouchsafe to me 
Of simple, care-free liberty — 
Like Treetop Land ! " 



"A BREATH FROM THE FIELDS" 

[To , who sent to me, in the city, a box of spring blossoms as 

"a breath from the fields "J 

"A breath from the fields!". . . 
Ah me, 
Could I paint the vision I see ! 

For under the spell of these flowers 
The thoroughfare, busy and hot. 
And the office, and work, are forgot ; 

And these granite and marble towers 
Quick vanish away, and quick 
The whole desert of fiery brick. 

"A breath from the fields ! ". . . 
All day 
My spirit has languished to stray 

From the City of Turmoil. And now. 
On the magical carpet of Thought, 
On the pinions these blossoms have brought, 



MISCELLANEOUS 151 

I am wandering where the bough 
Of the elm with the maple blends, 
And the song of the robin ascends. 

" A breath from the fields ! ". . . 
The sweets 
Of a myriad marguerites 

Are flooding with incense the air, 
And a dream my heart besets 
As I gaze on the violets — 

A dream and a splendor rare — 
Of a brook where the bloodroot drinks. 
And the laughter of bobolinks. 

" A breath from the fields ! ". . . 
I catch 
A view of the leafy thatch 

That waves on the meadow's marge. 
I roam in the shadows of trees 
Like those in Hesperides ! 

And I pluck from the branches the large, 
White, beautiful apple-sprays. 
Till the pain in my heart allays. 

"A breath from the fields ! ". . . 
Thank God 
For the friend who kneeled on the sod 

To gather such glory for me ! 
The blossoms will fade ; but depart 
Shall they never from out of my heart : 



152 POEMS OF NATURE 

There, forever, their beauty shall be, 
Like the blossoms that gladden the eyes 
Of the dwellers in Paradise. 



DAFFODILS 

Within the winding woodland aisles 

Which stately crown our northward hills, 
A myriad wilding daffodils 

Bloom gladly where the sunbeam smiles. 

How they in such unwonted earth 

Found home and blossomed, none may know ; 

But buds of a more beauteous glow 
Ne'er, out of poet's brain, had birth. 

Anigh their vernal, mossy bed 

The pine stands whispering to the spruce ; 

The striped squirrel — gay recluse! — 
Swings in the branches overhead. 

Around their prize the wondering bees. 
To such soft sweetness all unused, 
Buzzingly gather till infused 

With honey of Hesperides ! 

Thither the Naiads also come ; 
Thither the fairies fly in haste : 



MISCELLANEOUS 153 

Never more humble courtiers graced 
A Beauty's court in Christendom. 

Even the lady-ferns and sedges, 
Turning in sweet surprise to greet 
The beauty nestling at their feet, 

Give the pale strangers welcome pledges. 

Thither I, too, my steps retrace. 

Seeking the inspiration there ; 

Meeting within that charmed air 
A benediction face to face. 



SONATA OF THE DRAGON-FLY 

[The dragon-fly flew in at my open ofi&ce window in Boston one 
day in summer, a few moments after the receipt by me of a letter 
from a friend at Vineyard Haven. In the letter the writer of the 
same, by a strange coincidence, had playfully wished himself some 
winged creature in order that he might fly in at my city window and 
whisper in my ear the delights of his niral and seaside home !] 

I come, I come from distant shores ! — 
From where the wide Atlantic roars 

Around my island home ; 
Where pebbly strands unbroken lie. 
Ringed round with spray-cloud mystery. 

Ringed roimd with silvery foam ! 



154 POEMS OF NATURE 

I come from where the trembling pine 
Chants chorus to the heaving brine, 

Chants sonnets to the sea ; 
From where the myriad-leaved elm, 
On brink of wide Neptunian realm, 

Breathes soulful melody. 

I come from meadowy retreats, 
Where violets and marguerites 

The livelong day repose ; 
Where jauntily the golden-rod 
And tufted stalks of asters nod. 

Mingled with sweetbrier rose. 

I come from where the rippling brook 
Flows free through many a sylvan nook, 

Then leaps into the sun ; 
Where ferns and grasses guard the brink 
Where butterflies descend to drink, 

Their glad life just begun. 

I come from where the oriole's nest 
Hangs hidden beyond the eager quest 

Of hawk or schoolboy hand ; 
From where the yellow-bird's golden hue 
Flits by with a flash across the blue 

Of the high arch overspanned. 

I come from where at eventide 
The stars in majestic beauty glide, 
Outvying Arabia's days ; 



MISCELLANEOUS 155 

Where nightly the firefly's delicate lamp 
Gleams bright on the background cold and damp 
Of the furry, tasseled maize. 

I come, I come from distant shores ; — 
From where the wide Alantic roars 

Around my island home ; 
Where pebbly strands unbroken lie, 
Ringed round with spray-cloud mystery, 

Ringed round with silvery foam ! 



BODY AND SPIRIT 

The fair October sky is clear. 
The summer haze has fled ; 

The glory of the woods is near. 
The maple's leaves are red. 

The cloudless morning sun is mild. 
The fern its fragrance yields. 
" Come out into the woods, my child, 
Come out into the fields ! " 

' T is thus I hear my Mother speak, — 

My Mother, Nature dear ; 
And while her breezes fan my cheek 
I linger still to hear. 



156 POEMS OF NATURE 

" These perfect days were never meant 
For toil of hand or brain," — 
But made to roam the continent 
Or sail the misty main. 

"The world is too much with us." — Yea, 
For all men but a few 
Earth's toil and strain from day to day 
Are life's sole residue ! 

God ! for what the sun and sky ? 
For what the leafy wood ? 

Shall men forever live and die 
And call the worse the good ? 

But ah ! — myself — myself am bound 
Within the city's moil ! 

1 cannot break, myself, the round 

Of endless daily toil ! 

In vain the beckoning sumach calls. 

In vain the rose is red ; 
While labor's mocking hour-hand crawls 

The aster's gold is dead ! 

Ah well ! my mind is still my own ; 

My heart no fetters gyve : 
My soul is monarch of a throne 

Which through all years shall thrive. 



MISCELLANEOUS 157 

To toil my body Fate may urge, — 

But unconfined and free 
My spirit roams the mountain's verge 

And sails the sunUt sea. 



MYSTIC RIVER 

[1881] 

O miniature river ! winding free 
Through widening meadows to wider sea, 
Beautiful, beautiful art thou to me ! 

Men look on thy narrow wave, and laugh ! . . . 
Little they know of the cup I quaff ! 
And what carest thou for their idle chaff ! 

Thou art narrow, and sluggish, and muddy oft, 
And thy margin is oozy, and low, and soft ; 
It is no wonder that men have scoffed : 

For men are thoughtless, through and through ; 

And men are idle and sluggish too, 

And they laugh at themselves when they laugh at you. 

Thou art wider at times — when the upward tide 
Brings a torrent of brine from the ocean's side, 
And seaweed and kelp on thy current glide. 



158 POEMS OF NATURE 

Then pleasure-barks on thy surface float, 
And fair lips wreathe into joyous note 
While fair hands hasten each onward boat. 

Thou art wider still when the tide comes in 
With a rush and a roar from the sea, and a din 
Like that on the beach when the storms begin. 

Then over thy wave the sea-gull dips, 

And screams to his fellows, while slowly drips 

The salt sea spray from his pinions' tips ! 

And thou takest thy birth in lakes that are large, 
With villages fair on their prosperous marge, — 
And yet almost as lone as when swept by the barge 

Of the Indian hunters now lying asleep 

Where the willow bends low and the larches weep 

On the westering slopes of Walnut steep ; — 

In lakes that are quiet, and calm, and still, 
Where the bobolink's laugh and the thrush's trill 
Re-echo o'er forest and meadow and hill. 

But, river ! if thou in thy breadth wert as great 

As the Stream of the South where it pours through 

the gate 
Of golden Brazil, and runs separate 

For leagues in the brine, ever fresh, ever pure ; 
If thou in precipitous depths didst endure 
Dark caverns and cliffs such as oceans immure ; 



MISCELLANEOUS 159 

If thou in the circling embrace of thy banks 
Held gardens by hundreds, and castles in ranks, 
And vineyards like those in the land of the Franks ; 

If thou, with Euphrates and Gihon, didst run 
By the Garden of God, and didst mirror the sun 
As when first over Eden the dawn had begun ; — 

Ev'n then thou couldst never peace richer impart, 
Nor ever be dearer, O stream, in my heart. 
Than thou in thy slumber and sluggishness art ! 

For oft when my bosom with conflict was torn. 
Thou, placid, hast crooned, " Child, for peace thou 

wast born ! " — 
Till thy calmness my strife of its passion has shorn. 

And sacred to me, doubly, trebly, thy tide. 

For the friends now far sundered and scattered world 

wide 
With whom in my youth I have walked by thy side/ 

' Walnut Hill was the earlier name of the present College Hill 
(Tufts College). During the years since this poem was written the 
old Indian burial-ground has disappeared, its site being now occu- 
pied by residences — in some of which, if the belief of a number of 
the inhabitants of the neighborhood is well founded, the sorrowful 
spirits of the long-departed aborigines make themselves from time to 
time manifest in rebuke of the desecration by the white man of their 
eternal camping-ground ! The Mystic lakes, also, wear no longer so 
completely the aspect of solitude as in the years previous to 1880. 
The dam and lock in the river, at Medford, now holding the upper 
reaches of the stream at flood, are of recent date. 



i6o POEMS OF NATURE 



SUNSHINE 

" Wohlauf ! es nift der Sonnenschein 
Hinaus in Gottes freie Welt ! " 

— TiECK : Zuversicht. 

O sluggish slumberer, awake ! — 

The sunlight calls thee ! 
Earth's sullen clods beneath thee quake ; 
The promised buds of springtide break ; 
The green sedge quivers by the lake. 
No longer winter's gloom appalls thee, — 
But out where birds and blossoms wake, 

God's sunlight calls thee ! 

The bobolink beside the brook 

Sings, never weary ; 
The elms, that wings so long forsook, 
Again for nests and joyance look ; 
And where the snow-hung elder shook. 
And sighed through all the winter dreary. 
The robins, as in ^sop's Book, 

Chant loud and cheery. 

Within the woodland green and wild. 

The fern is springing ; 
And near the maiden-hair so mild. 



MISCELLANEOUS i6i 

And golden mosses high up-piled, 
The violet. Nature's favorite child, 
Its fragrance on the air is flinging. 
How often hath its breath beguiled 
My heart to singing ! 

O weary soul, beset by toil 

From dawn till gloaming ! 
Like Bunyan's Pilgrim, flee the broil ! 
Forsake the city's ceaseless moil ; 
Come out, and tread the tender soil 
Of Beulah, where no footstep, roaming, 
Fails of the priceless wine and oil 

Of Nature's foaming. 

Pale students ! poring over books 

And musty Latin ! 
Shakespeare read sermons in the brooks ! 
Through far Ionian seas and nooks 
Old Homer, godlike in his looks. 
Roved singing of Earth's robe of satin ! 
And Virgil's shepherds timed their crooks 

To Nature's matin. 

O aching feet ! enforced to tread 

Hot urban places ! 
That fain would wander, fain would wed 
The velvet of some mossy bed ! 
Your pathway, as the Prophet said, 



i62 POEMS OF NATURE 

May sometime be through flowery spaces ; 
Through meadows with the happy dead, 
In heavenly places ! 

O sorrowing heart ! — for him, for her, 

Who left thee weeping ! 
Canst thou not deem this wondrous stir 
Of springtide leaf and gossamer 
A mild angelic minister ? 
This wakefulness, where all was sleeping, 
Is it not Heaven's own messenger 

To stay thy weeping ? 

May not the clouds that roll afar 

On life's horizon 
Flee too, like winter's broken bar ? 
And in their stead a glittering star 
Arise, that aeons shall not mar ? 
This is the hope our heart relies on ; — 
And such may be, when rolls ajar 
Heaven's fair horizon. 



MISCELLANEOUS 163 



PAN 

Did some one say that Pan is dead ? 

Then what was that sweet sound I heard 
Which first I thought was song of bird, 
But then perceived was far too sweet 
For robin with it to compete ? — 
I know that Pan not yet is fled ! 

If still you think 't was bird's refrain, 
Oh, stand with me beside this tree ; 
Oh, stand a moment silently, 

And when the strain again rings out — 
There ! hark ! Who sways that vine about ! 
Is that not Pan with dryad train ? 

Persist you 't is but sun and shade ? 
Why ! oaks' and maples' rustling limbs 
Ne'er tuned such sweet outlandish hymns 
As these dear olden runes that seem 
The echo of some Attic dream. 
No pipe but Pan's such sounds e'er made ! 

Nay, comrade, you are surely wrong. 
Rare tones like these no purling brook 
Made ev'n in loveliest forest nook. 
Dear Pan himself is hidden there, 
Enshrined within that leafy lair ; 
'T is he that ripples thus in song. 



i64 POEMS OF NATURE 

You say it is a little child 

With its companions playing there ! 
Red clover-blossoms in its hair, 
Its mother crooning melodies ! — 
Ah ! that 's the gladdest thing there is, 
If Pan indeed no more runs wild ! 

Yet what are birds and trees and brooks, 
And what a child and mother fair. 
But Nature sublimate and rare 
Outbursting into sweetest strain. 
Compelling laughter, numbing pain ! — 
These all are Pan, as in the books ! 



POEMS OF NATURE 

//. SONNETS 



ONE WITH ALL 

I love all changes of the earth and air ! 
A day of sleety turmoil is to me 
A rare magnificence, and I could flee 
Eager and happy to the storm-wind's lair. 

When pounds the tempest through the hills all bare, 
Or thunder cannonades the beating sea. 
Spirit of Nature ! still I speed with thee, 
Clinging triumphant in thy streaming hair. 

Then comes a day amid the flowers and ferns, 

When breathing zephyrs and low-murmuring bees 
Speak Nature's mood a poppy-like repose. 

The flame is mine with which rhodora burns. 
The fragrance mine of scented herbs and trees. 
And I am drop in every brook that flows. 



165 



i66 POEMS OF NATURE 



IN SUBURBAN WOODS 

How sifts the sunlight through these oaks outspread ! 
And through their boughs what flash of crimson 

wings ! 
Each cup and fern a fragrant censer swings. 
Earth's loveHness to me is daily bread. 

At this rich board I bow my grateful head, 
And eat and drink, the while my bosom sings, 
Forgetting for an hour the thousand stings 
Of yonder city — Palace of the Dead ! 

At every living tomb, or south or north. 

The spirit, hearkening, heareth Nature chide : 
" O souls of men, to beauty why so slow ! 

Day's realm awaits you ! Lazarus, come forth ! " 
And then, to them that stand the grave beside : 
" Unbind their cerements ! Loose, and let them 
2:0." 



SUNRISE IN CODMAN PARK 

[Dorchester, Massachusetts] 

From hilltop circled by the sleeping town 
I seaward gaze where gleams the early day. 
The mists still clothe the valley-lands in gray, 
But harbor islands wear a gem-set crown. 



SONNETS 167 

Southward, the Blue Hill summits doff their frown, 
Reflecting eagerly each new-born ray ; 
While through the elms the robin to the jay 
His gauntlet of ecstatic song throws down. 

For me alone is this exalting bliss ? 

For me alone these fugue-resounding walls 
Which flush with beryl and with sapphire blaze ? 

O sluggard souls, ye know not what ye miss 
Who bring not sorrow to these sunrise-halls 
To find it vanish in these notes of praise. 



IN VACATION 

Under my Bodhi-tree cross-Iegg'd I sit. 
And meditate in silent, grateful glee. 
Between me and the sunset swallows flit, 
Swift-wing'd across the gorgeous tapestry. 

Crimson and gold — all wonderful to see — 
The west is gateway to unfathomed calm ; 
Serenity from hill and rock and tree 
Bathes my freed spirit in unwonted balm. 

What wonder I respond with inward psalm ! 

What wonder earthly gauds seem poor and bare ! 
With marvels Nature meets my outstretched'palm, 
And smiles that I inhale this heavenly air. 

"Oh why so slow," she cries, "to seek my face. 

When peace, in all earth's quest, hath else no place ! " 



i68 POEMS OF NATURE 



BY DARK OR LIGHT 

Nature, by dark or light thy Hfe I drink ! 
The midnight stars behold me as I gaze, 
And smile in answer, hinting that the days 
Are but Eternity's half-lumined brink. 

The night is opportunity to think ! 

And soul's own inner orbs expand and blaze 
When round the shepherd Pole the star-flocks graze 
And fires of boreal Vulcans glow and shrink. 

Yet when in eastern skies the steeds uprear 
Which Phoebus urges to celestial flight, 
The day brings eloquence night's lustre bars : — 

The sheen of dewy meadows far and near, 
The opal hills, the ocean's purple might, 
And human faces lovelier than all stars. 



ENCHANTED GROUND 

I am a Parsee. Thee I praise, O Sun ! 
Squirrel nor thrush is earlier astir 
Than I when, bursting through the upland fir, 
I mount some steep to hail new Dawn begun. 

And when the showery west, all diamond-spun. 
Is pied with flame as dies Day's messenger, 
I gaze still rapt, — Light's loyal worshiper, — 
And hymn the hymns of priests in Babylon. 



SONNETS 169 

Omar ! the earth was all enchanted ground 
To thee who sold thy rosary for wine — 
The wine of Beauty, filling Nature's cup. 

Thy temple's arch the sky alone could bound. 

Scaling its walls, — no narrower worship mine, — 
To Heaven each day I climb exultant up. 



SO LIKE THE SPRING SHE STANDS 

[Written of my Daughter] 

Again we wander — she, my soul's delight, 
And I, her dear companion, lover, friend — 
To hilltops where the elms and maples send 
Their first faint greenness through the landscape 
bright. 

The flicker calls us to pursue his flight ; 
The robin welcomes us to join the trend 
Of lavish life upspringing, and to spend 
Improvidently on the ear and sight. 

Once more, as when she plunged her infant hands 
In wealth of Western prairies, — years between, — 
We search and sing and know life still is sweet. 

Yet now, dear girl ! so like the Spring she stands, 
To gaze upon her fairness of eighteen 
My eye forsakes the windflower at my feet. 



170 POEMS OF NATURE 



THE EARTH AT PLAY 

Acres of daises, — buttercups between, — 
And over them the sunny Sunday sky ! 
Daisies as thick as stalks in fields of rye ; 
More buttercups than eyes before had seen 

Though love had measured tenfold ; spires of green 
The gowans gay uptossing, — straight, awry, 
O'erswung, upsoaring, — endless to the eye ; 
The yellow crowfoot hordes enmeshed serene. 

I think if I could count those blooms afield. 
Which yesterday the wanton breeze o'erswept 
In billows white, green, golden, I could say 

How many love-lights children's faces yield 
When kisses greet them after they have slept. 
And they go out to join the earth at play. 



HILLS OF MORNING 

I wake — and gaze. Behold! a mountain range 
Which never from my window showed before ! 
What magic reared those precipices strange, 
Adown whose depths vague avalanches pour ! 

The mighty mass — dim distances away — 
Heaves on and on, an Adirondack pile. 
My soul hangs worshipful, and fain would stay 
To gaze where soars such marvel mile on mile. 



SONNETS 171 

But then I see, with heart that sudden sinks, 
Vast slaty clouds are all my heavenly view ! 
My continent of towering summits shrinks 
As streaming Day transmutes to gold the blue. 
Yet, eyes, repine not ! on your sight was cast 
Undreamed-of beauty, though so soon o'erpast. 



COMRADES 

I hear him calling — I must go awhile. 

For compact we have made most true and strict. 
When either hails, then ere the sun has nicked 
Ten seconds on the oak-top's soaring dial. 

The other — faithful in the loyal style 

Of souls whose confidence was never tricked 

By comrades proving dull or derelict — 

Must answer through the woodland's leafy aisle. 

Then shut, my Shakespeare, — Plato, you may wait ; 
My cornfield, sun and rain may care for you ; 
Sad world, an hour I leave you to your plight ! 

Ceaseless the cark of Body, Mind, and State, 
While love's sweet fellowships are far and few. 
He calls — I answer. " Here 's Bob White ! " " Bob 
White ! " 



172 POEMS OF NATURE 



TO MY OLD WHEEL 

Thousands of miles of richness ! lofty joy 

Beyond what noblest verse might hope to swell ! 

Ungrateful, then, should I not strive to tell 

The benediction of thy rare employ. 
Through thee, Atlantic's edge hath been my toy ; 

Through thee, my heart hath danced in field and 
fell; 

Through thee, unnumbered draughts at Bethlehem's 
well 

Have sins assuaged and banished world's annoy. 
Through thee, the hills their purple haze have lent ; 

Voices of bobolinks have been the choir 

Which tuned the grottoes where I found a shrine ; 
Hemlock and larch have swung my studious tent ; 

Morning and eve have lit my sacred fire ; 

Paphos, the Muses, and God Pan were mine. 



ON CROSSING THE CHARLES AT 

ITS MOUTH 

O river, over which at morn and night 
To daily toil the lightning-harnessed car 
Swift hurries me in worn or thoughtful plight, — 
Full many a dream thou bring'st of happier star ! 



SONNETS 173 

All thoughtless were the hours I spent on thee 
And rowed or drifted up or down thy tide, 
Winging with gulls into the upper free, 
Speeding with ships to lands of Eastern pride. 

Far back as dear those days of boyhood sweets, 
Where growth and health were won for later toil : 
No crash of pride or change which fortune meets 
Can mar old gains or darling memories spoil. 

To-day rude traffic on thy breast may roar. 

Still calm I float along an Eden shore. 



A SPRAY OF HEMLOCK 

You spray of hemlock on my city wall, 

I gaze at you remembering whence you came ! 
That thence I ravaged you, oh, bear no blame. 
For winter now enshrouds me in its pall. 

I listen, and I hear the squirrels call 

Which shot your living green with tawny flame ; 
Ay, listen, and I seem to hear the same 
Dear murmur of the gurgling brooklet's fall. 

I crush your fragrant fibres in my hand, 
And senses swim with spicy odors won ; 
Above me, wide cerulean depths expand, 

Where snowy shallops sail enriched with sun ; 
I need no more to dream of Beulah-land, 
Thyself art Beiilah here and now begun. 



174 POEMS OF NATURE 



GULL AND WAVE 

When oft, a boy, I sought the lonely bay 
In winter, when the icy surges crashed, 
I hailed the waves companions as they dashed, 
And leaped from rock to rock as wild as they. 

Along the shore I flew, to meet the spray ; 

And when with brine the gulls and I were splashed, 
I joined their screams, as joyed and unabashed. 
The gulls and I were brothers in that day. 

O wider zones which years have called to sight, 
O thought and toil, O soul's exultant dream, 
O friendship of good women and good men — 

Together ye have wrought for life's delight : 
Yet happy I when comes in sleep the gleam, 
The rapture, of the gull and wave again. 



EXEMPLAR 

How am I worthy that you thus should bring. 
Dear friend, to glorify my city room. 
Wild-primrose leaves and clustering strawberry- 
bloom. 
First marvels of cold April's blossoming ? 

These crimson maple-buds lift voice and sing ; 

And though my sunless casements look on gloom. 
And winds to-day from eastward wail and boom, 
I sit companioned by refulgent Spring. 



SONNETS 175 

" How am I worthy ? " Nay, 't was not my worth 
But thy beneficence that roamed the wood 
And brought these wonders to revive my heart ! 

Shall Syrian dreamer's dream come yet to birth, 
And all mankind know earth's abundant good, 
In Nature's richness sharing part and part ? 



ON CAPE ANN 

How wondrous were the breakers that rare day ! — 
A day in happy memory secure ! 
Not forty added years provide the lure 
To shroud the picture in forgetful gray : 

The summer sunrise flooding all the bay, 

The gray, ribbed sands which ceaseless shocks 

endure ; 
While, buoyant in youth's dauntless vestiture, 
Two boys were daring the tumultuous fray. 

Shot through with sun, the waves rolled mobile in, 
Great walls of gleaming topaz, liquid flame, 
Engulfing us in tides of heavenly fire. 

With awe we plunged amid the whirling din — 
To rise refulgent ! for our forms became 
Like Hermes' when he flashed in gods' attire. 



176 POEMS OF NATURE 



DEAR MOTHER EARTH 

Fair is the prisoned sunlight in a gem, 
But dreary doom were city in the sky 
Whose walls, foundations, gateways, low and high, 
Were " beryl," " jacinth," " chrysolite." To them 

Who dwell there, Allah's peace ! — but I should stem 
The bright grim battlements, and crave to fly 
Down to dear Mother Earth again, where I 
Am healed if I but touch her garment's hem. 

These silver birches drenched with morning dew, 
These sumachs clambering from the jeweled grass, 
No realm of gold and chrysoprase could give. 

An Eden new each day I wander through. 
And pines and hemlocks, towering as I pass, 
Enwall the Heaven where I could love and live. 



TWO WISPS OF STRAW 

I have seen straw afield, what time the grain 
Of rich September rose in yellow shocks. 
And wondered at the wealth which brawn and brain 
Had tortured, tireless, from New England's rocks. 

And I have viewed rare galleries arrayed 

With tapestries of straw from Orient shrines, 

By patient artist fingers interlaid 

In storied scenes and arabesque designs. 



SONNETS 177 

But these two tattered wisps which I beheld 
To-day as Winter is just loosening hold, 
Gave inward vision rarer joy than welled 
At human artifice or harvest gold : 
For these were woven to a bluebird's tune, 
And spoke of treetop joyance and of June. 



NATURE'S FOUNDLINGS 

When lush Marsh-Marigolds their bloom unfold 
In moisty vales where April brooklets run, 
They lift their yellow radiance to the sun 
In joyance never dreamed by market gold. 

Near them, frail Bloodroot — meek though sanguine 
stoled — 
Her white plumes blossoming from juices dun — 
Playfully trembles at the mocking fun 
Of Cranesbill shuddering as if ghostly old. 

I laughed with them to-day on sunny banks 
O'erhung by hemlocks widely topping all. 
And raised my own glad song in quiet thanks 

That on this busy, phantom-chasing Ball 
One soul at least was free to join the ranks 
Of Nature's foundlings beyond city wall. 



178 POEMS OF NATURE 



THE SECRET 

How blest am I, who blissfulness can find 
In commonest delights that greet my hand ! 
I cannot flee Earth's richness ; — - move or stand, 
Her treasure to my coffers is inclined. 

The clouds that seem the sky and earth to bind, 
The daisies dancing to the breezes' band, 
The waves that roll to wedlock with the land, — 
My beggar's bowl runs over, glory-lined ! 

The meadow-sparrow's muse, the sun's caress. 
The challenge of the cliffside's beckoning call. 
The comradeship of brooks along my path, — 

To some, a sighing in the wilderness ! 
Yet forum, theatre, nor banquet-hall, 
Nor gold, nor power, nor praise, such blessing hath. 



SONNETS 179 



SPIRIT WITH SPIRIT 

The pall has fled which dulled the early east — 
The swift white wonder of the dawn is nigh. 
Refreshed, transfigured, by the night passed by, 
I leap participant to Nature's feast. 

Oh, marvelous, that I, who seem the least 
Of natural things beneath this roseate sky. 
Should thus exalted be — that thus am I 
On hilltop chanting, worshiper and priest. 

O body of me, which fifty years hath sprung 
Up craggy heights and foraged in the dales. 
Still youth's elastic fibre thrills in thee ! 

O soul within, that ages old hath sung 
In skyey deeps where spirit Spirit hails, 
Thine still is youth — thine, ageless ecstasy. 



i8o POEMS OF NATURE 



THE PENDULUM 

Nature, in thy glad temple, to and fro. 
Ever the pendulum of beauty swings ; 
Summer or winter, spring or autumn, brings 
Rapture of eye where'er we turn or go. 

Dawn-dew, the virtue of the sunrise-glow. 

The grasses' strength, the spruces' freshening rings, 
Fall's smokeless flame, white wreaths December 

flings, — 
Largess of beauty gods might joy to know. 

Surely, O Nature, thine no mocking bloom ! 
Vibrates thy pendulum not aimlessly, — 
An order meaningless, — a dial-less clock ! 

Yet where revolve thy hands that point our doom ? 
And how through ages is rewound thy key ? 
No answer greets us though we knock and knock. 




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POEMS OF NATURE 

///. SONNETS OF THE BLUE HILLS RESERVATION, 
MASSACHUSETTS 



INDIAN SUMMER 

Back for a day or two are come the glow 
And warmth of August, as October wanes. 
The air is languorous glory. The proud stains 
Of ripened verdure signal high and low 

O'er hill and dale. Soft showers come and go. 
Forgetting yesterday's sharp frosts and pains, 
Earth laughs at losses, rich with sudden gains 
As magic lights and shadows sink and show. 
" Come out and visit us ! " the Blue Hills call : 
" From Rattle Rock or Chickatawbut scaled 
See leagues of undulating glory spread ! 

Hourly my crimson curtains rise and fall ; — 
Oh come, nor let my pageant pass unbailed, 
No footfall sounding but the fox's tread ! " 



i8i 



i82 POEMS OF NATURE 



IN THE BLUE HILLS IN NOVEMBER 



In the Storm of Sunday, November ij 

Where Kitch-a-makin's rocky front upheaves 
O'er Sassamon's fair notch in rugged hnes, 
The clinging fern-growth full as bravely shines 
This dreary day as when the Spring unweaves 

The first rare fronds that venture. The wind grieves 
And sleet whirls wild ; but hazels wave me signs 
That tempests daunt them not, and blackberry-vines, 
Still green and red, run riot through dead leaves. 

In Sassamon, through all the Winter's snows. 
Those ferns from their bleak crevices peep out 
And hail the hardy wanderer through the hills. 

They never fail him. Happy he who knows. 
Amid the city's lonely-populous rout, 
Where welcome waits which soothes all earthly ills. 



/« the Sunshine of Sunday, November 20 

November — fickle monarch — jocund rules : 
For what a morning ! — air the air of May, 
In Sassamon the chickadees at play, 
And zephyrs dancing over ice-clad pools ! 

Nahanton's frosty forehead steams and cools, 
And on his shriveled breast, so lately gay. 



BLUE HILL SONNETS 183 

Dead stalks of golden-rod and asters sway 

In ghostly caps and bells — poor Nature-fools ! 

Alas ! 't is but an hour or two of sun, 

And then the freezing night shall lull again 
To dreamless sleep this dull half-wakened bee ! 

Yet flaunt, O sumach-plumes, till day is done ! 
Your faith, surviving keenest joy and pain 
Which life can blend, is eke the faith of me. 



ON HANCOCK HILL 

On Hancock Hill are joys all lovers know 

Whose loves are birds and flowers, and tinkling 
brooks 

That run unseen though heard, 'neath rocky 
nooks, — 

Mysterious streams as those of storied flow. 
O ferny dells ! O chestnuts bending low ! 

I hail you and return the tender looks 

You give admirers, while your leafy hooks 

Reach out to hinder them what time they go. 
For me, I go not hastily, — too sweet 

The prospect distant and the riches near ; 

And oft I witness, as I pass a-thrill, 
The violet and the cranesbill touch and greet, 

Each whispering, " No harm from him we fear ; 

He loves us all too well, on Hancock Hill." 



1 84 POEMS OF NATURE 



IN WILDCAT NOTCH 

No more the wildcat snarls in these stern aisles ; 
Gray frisking squirrels in his haunts have home, 
And hither, thither, bright-hued insects roam, 
Gay gleams of color 'gainst dim rocky piles. 

No wolf now lurks with predatory wiles ; 
But from their coverts in the forest dome 
Veery and ovenbird flash amid the gloam. 
Their clarions ringing through these rude defiles. 

For me, here throned on mossy granite ledge, 
'Neath pines serene that utter Orient balm, 
Earth's brute contentions fade and are forgot. 

Anew to simpleness my soul I pledge. 

Nirvana — conscious unison with Calm — 
Expands within me. Strife henceforth is not. 



IN WONDER EVERY HOUR 

[ At " The Crags "] 

I gaze anew in wonder every hour 

At all the strange sweet beauty of the world — 

The marvel of the nearest budding flower ; 

Dark cloud-rack flying ; waves in frolic curled. 
Yon harbor's edge a realm of mystery glows — 

Each circling beach a lure of sands and shells. 



BLUE HILL SONNETS 185 

The secret of these hills my spirit knows 
And drinks refreshed at Meditation's wells. 
Last night the darkness caught me on The Crags 
High hung above the alder-shaded spring ; 
October maples waved their radiant flags 
And showed my feet each crevice where to cling. 
Earth's grief and toil ! how futile is your fuming 
When thus for me each hour some rose springs 
blooming. 



WINTER GLORY 

A few gay snow-birds with their brave " Cheep, 
cheep ! " 

Allured my feet this morning to the hills. 

The earth is snow-clad, but melodious rills 

'Neath icy crust refuse to lie asleep. 
No step till mine has crunched the vale or steep 

Since came the snow ; but trails the partridge drills 

Are plain to wondering sight, and vision thrills 

At tracks where foxes lurk and rabbits leap. 
Up gleaming Chickatawbut's slippery cone 

I climb to view far Cheshire's flower of white.' 

Below me calls the hardy chickadee ; 
The keen breeze through the pines has bravest tone ; 

With sun the frost-fringed oak-leaves are alight. 

One are brook, bird, and leaf, and heart of me. 

' The peak of Monadnock, sixty-eight miles distant. 



1 86 POEMS OF NATURE 

ON BOARD SHIP IN SASSAMON 
NOTCH 

To-day the pines on Kitch-a-makin roar. 

Far up, their snowy topsails thrash and sway 

Like reeling ships in Ocean's Titan play, 

While through this granite notch such currents pour 

Of biting blasts unleashed from Winter's store. 
That I can hear and feel the hurtling spray 
Of tempests thundering in Baffin's Bay, 
Where I am shipwrecked on that Arctic shore ! 

You sailors on the February main. 

To-day your jovial sea-songs are you chanting, 
As in the tales which fireside readers please ? 

Or are you clinging — ice-clad, numb with pain, 
In desolate despair and horror panting — 
To frozen shrouds in pitiless swashing seas ! 



GAIN STILL THE GOAL 

[ On Doe Hollow Path ] 

On wide-spread wing, O hawk, thou sailest high. 
While I, good lack ! toil plodding through the snow ! 
If I, like thee, might too on pinions go 
Should I be happier in that trackless sky ? 

On wings should I be free from cause to sigh ? 
Would strifes be absent, life no bafflings know ? 



BLUE HILL SONNETS 187 

No grief thou hast in any winds that blow ! 

Should I be thou — or should I still be I ! 
Silent, thou wingest from my ken. No less, 

O denizen of untried altitudes, 

In my brief sight of thee is food for thought. 
I will content me with what power to bless 

These snowdrifts offer, and by patient roods 

Gain still the goal thy flight had swifter brought ! 



VINE AND BIRCHES 

A Fable of Pine- Tree Brook 

To-day the vine and birches held commune. 
(I know their language, for I listen much — 
And love their speech, their sanity is such. 
They sometimes even bid me join their rune ! ) 

To-day love's friendliness was all their tune. 
Indignant that December's boisterous touch 
Had striven remorselessly the grapevine's clutch 
To rive from branches where it dreamed of June : 

" Hold brave, O Vine, against our breasts of snow — 
The springtime sun arrives again apace ! 
While speeds the earth, opposing winds shall blow ; 

Resolve ! — thy battling brings unlooked-for grace ! 
The bliss of summer eves thou yet shalt know, 
October's purple clusters crown thy face ! " 



i88 POEMS OF NATURE 



"THE SHANTY" 

[It is said that the opening sentence of " The Pilgrim's Progress," 
appropriated here, refers to the cramped cell in Bedford Gaol where 
Part I. of the famous allegory was written. ..." The Shanty " is a 
little, old house on an abandoned farm on the edge of the Blue Hills 
Reservation, hired by a group of a dozen or fifteen Nature-lovers 
who know the secret of its entrance, — wood being always stored at 
hand for the roaring fireplaces in winter, and a spring bubbling near 
for the thirsty in summer.] 

"As through the wilderness " of that dear world 
Where Care eludes and Rest and Worship meet, 
" I walked " to-day with ever freshening feet, 
" I lighted," while the beating snowstorm whirled, 

" Upon a certain place," in calmness furled, 

"Where was a Den." Not Bunyan's shamed re- 
treat, 
Which genius glorified with visions sweet. 
But just "The Shanty," by the roadside curled. 

Within the dooryard, skis and snowshoes propped 
Gave sign afar that Brothers of the Free 
Had come an hour to read or feast or play. 

What wonder that expectantly I stopped, — 

For howling winds, red logs, full minds, and glee 
Still widen walls as in rare Bunyan's day ! 



BLUE HILL SONNETS 



189 



THE SILVER BIRCH 



[Near Indian Camp Pool] 



I asked the silver birch how came its bark 

So passing fair, so wondrous to the sight. 

"Behold !" I said, "your cheeks how smooth and 
white. 

While all your woodsy kin are bossed and dark ! 
At eve, as I went singing through the park. 

Though Venus and Arcturus veiled their light, 

Your beckoning moonshafts, gleaming through the 
night. 

Drew eyes' swift archery, a shining mark ! " 
Then spake the tree : " We, too, were dull when earth 

First knew us ; but when winter's shroud of snow 

Enwrapped us, and our brothers wailed, we laughed ! 
A god quick cried, ' O birches, Man needs mirth : 

For all time in this snowy splendor glow ! 

Who solves your secret, life's best wine has 
quaffed ! ' " 



I90 POEMS OF NATURE 

THE PINE-TREE 

[At Wissahissick Pond] 

pine-tree, thou art Circe of the wood ! 

My path thou hast entangled and betrayed ! 
I saw thee, and thy smile betokened aid, — 
Thy balm seemed greater than all earthly good. 
Alas ! once lured beneath thy fragrant hood, 
Thy ruthless needles through my bosom played. 
Thy base enchantment now is open laid, 
But I am chained beyond all will and should. 

1 pray thee, pine-tree, loose thy fragrant trap ! 

At home my loved-ones for my coming stay. 
Unwitting of thy necromantic art. . . . 
Ah ! limbs at last have power thy charm to snap ! 
But as my body drags itself away. 
Thou, sorceress still, dost snatch and keep my 
heart ! 



BLUE HILL SONNETS 191 



TO A HEMLOCK ON CHICKA- 
TAWBUT 

Again I flee the city's arid stress 

To greet thee, forest brother dear and tried ! 
Recumbent in the heaven thy arms provide 
I thrill with ecstasy at thy caress. 

Against thy sun-warm sides my cheek I press, 
And know thee still my kin, as when in pride 
Our far-off ancestors towered side by side. — 
Thou still art tree ! I human more or less. 

When I have solved the secret of this flesh, 
My flame-freed ashes I in love decree 
Where some near sapling's roots may pierce my 
clay. 

I then shall flourish by thy side afresh. 
Once more upon the earth a glorious tree, 
While raptured others in my shade shall stray ! 



192 POEMS OF NATURE 



DECEMBER HILLTOPS 

The snow up-piled holds all the hills in calm. 

Their heights and hollows greet untracked the eye 
Of such rare voyagers as speed the sky 
Belated from the pinelands to the palm. 

And yet, O hills, to-day I sang your psalm 

Perched high on Hancock's summit, though my cry 
Made music for no eager passer-by 
Who craved as I your healing piny balm. 

No less speak well the bards and seers who say 
That to himself the singer's song returns, 
Though other ear may hear not or may scorn ; 

For, toiling up your heights, the drift-filled way 
And lofty view became as fire that burns — 
My song a chant at Heaven's high gate at morn. 



POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 

/. MISCELLANEOUS 



THE TRANSCENDENT POSSIBILITY 

Amid a treeless prairie vast 

A horseman stayed at set of sun : 
With eyes far strained o'er shadows dun 

He swept the waste his steed had passed, 

And onward, o'er the path to be. 
And there and here, on every side. 
But naught in Nature's round replied ; 

His gaze met blank obscurity. 

Yet, lo ! the man was Nature's child ! 
He trusted Her who gave him birth : 
He laid him on the flower-spread earth. 

Amid the grewsome vastness wild. 

He knew not he should wake again : 
To wake or sleep he knew was good. 



193 



194 POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 

In love with air and sea and wood 
His eyes he shut with sweet Amen. 

His arm for pillow — this was all ; 
Uncovered lay he on earth's breast : 
But rested he with gracious rest, 

And o'er him gleamed the star-set wall. 



THE KISS OF DEATH 

My little child lay moaning as she slept. 
What dream of evil through her slumbers crept 
I knew not — but her forehead I caressed, 
And to her trembling lips my own I pressed. 
Smiling, she woke. Her grief had taken wing. 
The kiss had power to make her sorrow sing. 

Is here a parable ? Is life a dream ? 
Doth all our anguish not exist, but seem .-* 
Daily — not sleeping, but awake — we moan ! 
Yes ! but the guest-room — it is Nature's own ; 
And may it be that she, when ends our breath, 
Wakes us to Peace with that sweet kiss of Death ? 



MISCELLANEOUS 195 



THE LOVED AND GONE 

Glad thought we give, proved true by tears, 

To those, the loved and gone, 
Who at our side in other years 

Inspired and helped us on. 
Their presence lingers with us still, 

As stars amid the night. 
The while they roam the dreamland hill 

Beyond our earthly sight. 

Oh, more than these who greet our eyes 

Are ye with silent feet ! 
And gratefully we recognize 

Your benediction sweet. 
We may not whisper loud each name, — 

Too sacred is our thought ; 
But humbly take, of praise or blame. 

The good ye to us brought. 

Be near us still to aid and bless, 

Ye friends of other days ! 
Soul yet doth feel your fond caress. 

Your olden likeness raise. 
Thus heart doth still respond to heart. 

And ye, though gone from sight, 
Are never dead, but still are part 

Of all our love and light. 



196 POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 



WHO KNOWS? 

What sailor knows, beneath the wave he Hes on, 

The secrets of the sea ? 
Who fathoms Time beyond the dim horizon 

Which bounds Eternity ? 

Who knows the endless deeps of skyey spaces ? 

The course the comets run ? 
Who knows what light illuminates men's faces 

Beyond the moon and sun ? . 

As children dream, so men have gazed in vision 

And seen a city blest. 
If such there be, what insight, grace, decision 

May glorify its rest ! 

We wonder daily what they may be doing 

In that fair realm afar : 
Nor deem we that their steps are but pursuing 

The space from star to star. 

Love, labor, progress ! — this the constant story 

Ascending Nature speaks ; 
Love, labor, progress ! — this were highest glory 

Of beatific weeks. 



MISCELLANEOUS 197 

" There will be Light ! " The Voice is Voice 
Eternal, 

And still the Light will be. 
New stars, new suns, new satellites supernal 

Blaze forth continually. 

Whose hands, it may be, clothe the high Sierras 

Of those new worlds with white ? 
Whose kindly fingers dissipate the terrors 

Of their Antarctic night ? 

Invention fails ; imagination falters ; 

We may not read the sky : 
But this we know : If there are heavenly altars, 

Affection stands thereby ! 

If thought and will go on to larger being, 

And do not stop with death. 
Then, surely, weak is all our earthly seeing. 

To that diviner breath. 

We still may hope — still magnify our dreaming — 

Nor fear the Future blank ; 
If Nature's law is steadfast, and not seeming, 

Life rises rank on rank. 

And if those souls still are, who bore our sorrows, 
Their fondness still must glow, 



198 POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 

The same devotion fill their fine to-morrows 
That cherished us below. 

They love us still ! the beautiful and tender, 

Who early, one by one, 
Have fled earth's darkness for supernal splendor, 

Earth's shadows for the sun ! 

O Angel-Sisters ! have us in your keeping ! 

We cannot dream you dead ! 
We feel our hearts might hear, were they not 
sleeping. 

Your pinions overhead ! 

O Angel-Mothers ! beautiful as Morning, 

And brighter than the Day ! 
Our earthly doubts with heavenly grace adorning, 

Ye steal our hearts away ! 



MISCELLANEOUS 199 



THE PASSING 

How came these words I may not note. 

I walked beneath the trangnil stars ; 

A Voice, as from, their golden bars. 
Said " Write ! " to me : I therefore wrote. 

Evn yet I feel the tremulous thrill I 

I tread again the pine-clad hill. 



A mystery ? — true ; yet I fear not to go. 
Nothing harsh can be. Indeed, when I know 

We walk not alone ; that within us and out 
Throbs ever the Might that engirds us about ; 

That the Power which developed us reigns through all, 
A limitless Sea — not a vertical Wall ; 

When I learn how the forces of death and life 
Intercircle forever, yet never at strife ; 

When I know that the order and beauty around 
With the life of the All-Life ever abound ; 

That every bird on every tree 

Is thrilled a-through with God's own glee ; 



200 POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 

That every gleam from human eye 

Is a gleam of the All-Soul's Mystery, — 

Fain would I leave this house of clay, 
To travel with God on his endless way ; 

To whirl with the atom and dance with the light, 
Or glow in a star to illumine earth's night. 

Things fail not. Though earth-life has passage like 

dreams 
The Order Eternal still pulses and streams. 

We know not " soul " passes ! We only can know 
That pass if it must, 't is to else it will go. 

It cannot be lost : it is bound up with All ; 
And, while anything lasts, shall the Soul of Things 
fall ? 

Come, Death ! You for him lack all terrors and 

pains 
Who deems, though he vanish, he deathless yet 

reigns. 



MISCELLANEOUS 201 



GONE 



From my sleep I start, and gaze without. 
What is this load — this load of doubt — 
This weight that presses so hard and deep 
Upon my heart that I cannot sleep ? 
That presses so hard — with such a heat — 
That my burning heart will scarcely beat ? 

Sunk is the star that beckoned me on ! 

She whom I loved is gone, is gone ! 

I gaze from my window — I gaze on high : 

Coldly the moon slants down the sky — 

Cold as the cold and icy weight 

That Hes in the Valley Desolate — 

That lies in the valley of death and gloom 

Where earth for its beautiful bride made room. 

Sunk is the star that beckoned me on ! 

She whom I loved is gone, is gone. 

Faint on my bed falls the light of stars : 
Red at the door of his tent stands Mars — 
Red as the lurid light that throws 
Vesuvius' shade on Italian snows. 
Faintly it falls on her lowly mound. 
And reddens the landscape all around. 

Sunk is the star that beckoned me on ! 

She whom I loved is gone, is gone ! 



202 POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 

Oh, what to my heart remains of good ! . . . 
I know that when last by her side I stood, 
She pointed her finger — she pointed high : 
" I die," she whispered, " yet shall not die ! " 
That finger uplifted I still can see ; 
And it beckons, eternally beckons to me. 

She whom I loved — ah no ! not gone ! 

The star that once beckoned still beckons 
me on ! 



POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 

II. SONNETS 



AT THE TURN OF THE ROAD 

When comes at last my destined hour to die ; 
When here entranced I may no longer stay 
To mingle in the wonders of the day — 
To wander hill and sea and watch the sky — 

I know my dust will most serenely lie : 
For confidence is mine in Nature's way ; 
I know her summons never can betray ; 
Her magic touch holds naught to terrify. 

If it were good to come, to learn of life, 
No less it must be good to go, to learn 
What strength and mystery reside in death. 

I here have known the full of joy and strife, 

And smiled throughout ; and at the highway's turn 
No whit less royally I yield my breath. 



203 



204 POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 



BY THE DARK -BRIGHT RIVER 

This is the dark-bright river, at whose side 
I stand in wonder while its waters moan, 
Seeming to hear a music all my own 
In the calm rote with which its currents glide. 

I stoop and dip my hand within its tide, 

Perchance to still the human doubt and groan 
Which round me rise from those who dread its tone, 
And prove it friend, not enemy, when tried. 

These sounds familiar which I seem to hear — 
These harmonies of constant birth and death — 
Are but the World-Soul's alternating play. 

As harmless as the sunset is this sheer 

Slow welling of the waters, and the breath 
Already circles of a breaking day. 



EASTWARD WINDOWS 

No more I see them at the accustomed pane, — 
Two glowing faces, fair and full of glee. 
That always smiled and signaled friendlily 
As I went daily down the morning lane. 

Each night when I returned, I looked in vain ; 
The sash was dark, nor could I ever see 
Or boy or girl to wave or welcome me : 
Yet with the morrow they were there again ! 



SONNETS 205 

The morning now is but another night : 

But all the lane now rings with songs not sad, 
Down flung from skies with this new bliss increased ; 

And oft I think, since they have taken flight, 
Of two bright morning faces making glad 
Some casement fronting the Eternal East. 



KNOWN OF OLD 

Where walks he — my companion' known of old, 
Star-bright, with whom I wandered arm in arm ? 
Each shielded each from the approach of harm, 
Each counseled each with loving wisdom bold. 

He vanished, and the summer path grew cold. 
For him nor me had life or death alarm ; 
No less, on hill and by the river farm 
I walk alone, while he the Way of Gold. 

Where now he treads, what sunrise-glories burn .? — 
I dream in vain his pathway through the blue, 
Yet feel 't is on and on, through endless mile. 

And doth he wait for me at some fair turn. 
With eager eye expecting me in view .? 
Be mine to make the meeting worth the while ! 

• Edward Foster Temple (1854-1899) ; Tufts, '81. 



2o6 POEMS OF THE IMMORTAL HOPE 



THE VANISHED 

The moon's bright sickle shines above the larch, 
A golden arc on shield of silvery blue. 
Eastward the dawn's white splendor, bursting 

through, 
Strives swiftly yonder westering stars to parch. 

But ah ! for us alone Day's lustrous arch. 
Around them quivering, outshines their hue : 
Glad eyes far distant, hailing Night anew. 
See them just mounting for their heavenly march ! 

O radiant loves and powers, and all fine graces 
Which daily, human shaped, around us sink. 
Far fleeing from our strained and questioning gaze ! 

Somewhere, it may be, gleam your shining faces 
Climbing to sight above Oblivion's brink, 
Somewhere anew your healing splendors blaze. 



ADDITIONAL POEMS 

/. THE BELLS OF COMO 



THE BELLS OF COMO 

[Read to the Zetagathean Society' of Tufts College Theological 
School, at its seventh public literary anniversary, May 26, 1881] 

In Italy beyond the sea — 
Dim, mediaeval Italy — 
When she whose ancient power and pride 
Had been for centuries thrown aside 
Was slowly waking from her sleep, 
And with the inspiration deep 
And ardor of a second birth, 
Among the nations of the earth 
Was striving for a nobler place ; — 
When all the Caesar-line was dust, 
And nothing but decay and rust 
Remained of the Imperial race ; 
And a new line of kings had come, 
Immortal throughout Christendom, — 
Dante and Michaelangelo 
And Petrarch and Boccaccio ; — 
When she, so long the nations' scoff, 

''■Zetagathean Society — The Society Seeking Good. 
207 



2o8 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Had risen and flung her languor off, 
And, waking, had disclosed her skill 
In marble, and her power to thrill 
And captivate with harmony 
A waiting, rapt humanity ; — 
In Italy beyond the sea, 
Dim, early modern Italy, 
Was born one day a little child, — 
A little weakling ! as if he, 
For whom was meant a destiny 
Amazing, luring, mocking, wild, 
Blissful at times, at times severe, — 
Humble, exalted, mild, austere, — 
Had been by Nature sent to be 
Even in birth an epitome 
Of all the dread, magnificent, 
Vain-glorious accomplishment 
Of his own native monarchy. 

He was a marvel of a child, 
His mother thought — the neighbors knew ; 
For often, as he lay, he smiled ; 
And closing his clear eyes of blue. 
Would bend his ear as if he caught 
Some echo of angelic thought. 
The murmur of rhythmic melody, 
A strain of heavenly harmony. 

When out of babyhood he passed. 
And grew in stature, and at last 



THE BELLS OF COMO 209 

Had come to boyhood, all his art, 
Untried, imperfect, yet in part 
Revealing what was in his heart, 
Was raptly exercised to bring 
From brass, from iron, from everything 
That answered with melodious ring 
When he should touch it, such a tone 
As always, when he was alone. 
Seemed ringing in the air around — 
The song still present, and the sound. 
Which once, when he a baby lay. 
The angels sang to him each day. 
And as he labored still, apart, 
And leaned to listen, — and on wings 
Of eager wishes would ascend 
Where yonder anthems seemed to blend. 
Echoing without hush or end, — 
His mother wondered at these things 
And pondered them within her heart, 
"What is it, Michael ? " she one day 
Entreated, " Tell me your desire ! 
Your eyes are radiant with a fire 
Like that on Como when the sun 
Is setting and the day is done. 
What is it ! Tell it me, I pray ! " 
But Michael only turned away. 
He had no words, no heart, to say. 
Unto his mother even, as yet, 
The longing that was in his soul. 
The wish not yet in his control. 



2IO ADDITIONAL POEMS 

But as he turned, his eyes were wet ! 
For even then there seemed to rise 
The ever-swelhng harmony, 
The far-off angel melody, 
Filling the blue, ethereal skies 
With sweetest notes, as if to wound 
His spirit with ideal sound. 

Swiftly the months and seasons ran, — 
The youth still musing, — till one day, 
With something of a wild dismay, 
He woke and found himself a man. 
His thought, his toil, his frequent prayer 
Had brought no laurel to his side ; 
His soul was still unsatisfied, 
His chimes were still but in the air. 

His chimes ! For it was Michael's aim, 
In manhood as in youth the same, — 
His one endeavor, — to create 
So marvelous a chime of bells, 
So fair and void of parallels. 
That they the soul would captivate, 
And a delighted world would own 
The music of their silver tone. 

" Some brotherhood of friars," said he, 
" Some convent here in Italy, 
Will gladly purchase them of me. 
Through all the world their fame will flow, 



THE BELLS OF COMO 211 

And pilgrims here will come and go, 
And honor will be mine, and I 
Will build me here a cottage fair, 
And on the morn and evening air, 
Ascending thither, fleeing there, 
Will hear their music till I die." 

No jangling chimes like those that rung 
Throughout the vale where Como lay 
When knelt the brotherhood to pray, 
Would Michael make ! but on the day 
When first his silvery bells were swung, 
The monks and friars should all confess 
Not sins alone and idleness. 
But that their prayers before had known 
No inspiration like the tone 
That echoed from the belfry-throne 
Where Michael's chimes rang ecstasy. 
Surpassed their music should not be 
By any flute of Arcady, 
Or any Hebrew timbrel old, 
Or any fabled harp of gold, 
Or any violin whose fame 
Had given to its maker's name 
A lustre more than marvelous — 
A halo such as still adheres 
To him who wrote upon his work 
A name which through the deathless years 
In Music's memory will lurk — 
Antonio Stradivarius. 



212 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

For years, in secret, Michael strove, 
Untiring, in a little grove. 
Casting and tuning still, anew. 
The metal cups from which he drew 
His hope of honor, wealth, and fame. 
Ahke to him were praise and blame, 
Coming from those who nothing knew 
Of his high vision or his aim. 
Baffled a myriad times, again 
Untiringly he toiled, and when 
With fleeing years his faith grew dim, 
Again the angels came to him. 

And so he strove — nor strove in vain 
For in the end his patient pain 
Accomplished all his heart's desire. 
He labored with his soul on fire ; 
And catching from the angels' song 
The melody he missed so long, 
He tuned in ecstasy sublime 
The clanging bells to perfect chime. 
Until they rang a silver tone, 
The echo of the angels' own. 

A week now hardly passed away 
When on the artist, pleased and proud, 
There called, with offer rich and rare, 
A neighboring friar of orders gray ; 
Who, having blest himself, and bowed. 
And laid his hand on Michael's hair. 



THE BELLS OF COMO 213 

"I come, my brother," — so he spake, — 

" For this your masterpiece to make 

With earnest prayer the prior's request. 

We offer you a price, and take 

With eager thankfulness confessed. 

And many a benediction rich. 

The wondrous metal marvels which. 

By holy Mother Mary blest. 

Aided by tireless prayer and thought, 

The cunning of your hands has wrought." 

This the beginning was. The rest, 
Just as he long had dreamed it all. 
Now came to Michael with such speed 
That in a month his cottage wall 
Was rising on the margin wide 
Of beautiful blue Como's side ; 
And he from toil and want was freed. 

At morning now, at noon and night, 
In rapture at his cottage door. 
Sheltered from summer heat and light 
By clustering vine and sycamore, 
Entranced did Michael daily sit. 
Waiting to hear the joyful peal, 
The anthem glad and glorious. 
Which from the convent on the height 
That rose his homestead opposite 
Announced the inmates' hour to kneel — 
Betrayed, with sudden and loud appeal. 



214 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Of pious intent their overplus, 
Or sounded the holy Angelus. 

Diviner melodies than these 
No chimes in all the w^orld could ring. 
To all who hearkened, heavenly ease, 
The ecstasies that angels know- 
Where founts of living waters flow. 
Their notes seraphic seemed to bring. 
To Michael's thought the blest retreat 
Of Eden had no music higher. 
Not fabled Orpheus' golden lyre 
Had ever sounded half so sweet. 
And if at favored Michael's feet 
Nor rock nor forest bowed and sang. 
His soul was often glorified 
With a triumphant, joyful pride 
Which Orpheus never knew or dreamed : 
For when at morn or eventide 
His chimes their silver music rang. 
To him, ah ! then to him it seemed 
The waiting angels circled low. 
And caught and raised the echo high. 
And flung it over hill and glen ; 
And when the anthem ceased to flow. 
Upbore it with them to the sky 
And closed it with a sweet Amen. 

But now throughout the peaceful vale, 
Along the placid lakelet's marge. 



THE BELLS OF COMO 215 

The storm of war, its iron hail, 
The beat of angry foreign flail, 
The din of clashing spear and targe, 
Came suddenly and awfully. 

As when from out a summer sky, 
Where flakes of fairest amber hue 
Against a ground of gold and blue 
All day have floated gorgeously, 
There leaps a sudden awful flash, 
The lightning's angry augury ; 
And with a quick, tumultuous crash 
The thunder follows, and the pale 
Blue zenith thickens with the charge 
Of cloudy cohorts ; and the large 
And sturdy oak — which hitherto, 
Whatever stormy tempest blew, 
Had towered unsmitten — when the hail 
And whirlwind and the furious blow 
Have ceased, lies shattered, rootless, low, 
All lifeless ; — so throughout the vale 
Of Como, and through all the land, 
There came the storm of war ; and so, 
When turmoil met its overthrow, 
And the red, desolating brand 
Had fallen from the invading hand, 
And Michael again reached his home 
From fighting in the ranks of Rome, 
No stone above another lay 
Where he in love, in happier day, 



2i6 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Had reared his modest tower and dome. 
The grove where he for years had toiled 
The torch had ruthlessly despoiled, 
And more calamitous than all, 
Gone was the monkish brotherhood ! 
And erst where cell and cloister stood, 
And prayer re-echoed wall to wall. 
Now wrapped in winding-sheet and pall 
The convent in a ruined heap 
Of ashes lay upon the steep. 
And Michael's bells ! his masterpiece ! 
His peerless, his unrivaled bells. 
Whose chimes were never more to cease ! 
The mocking mob of infidels 
Had stolen them away, and left 
Their maker mournful and bereft. 
The light was taken from his eyes ; 
The gate was shut on Paradise. 

"Alas ! " he murmured. "Woe is me ! 
My cup for all futurity 
Is filled with misery to the brim ! " 
What now indeed remained for him ! 
His home, his family, his health 
For labor, and his little wealth. 
These all were gone ! And even the sound 
That once had echoed in the air, 
Luring him upward from the ground 
With melody beyond compare — 



THE BELLS OF COMO 217 

Sounding from heavenly citadels : 
This too had vanished with his bells. 

Or so it seemed to him at first ; 
For afterwards, as he one day 
Was kneeling on the ground to pray — 
The ruined ground where he of yore 
Had sat beside his cottage door, — 
Upon his ear a sudden burst 
Of the old melody on high 
Rang rapturously ; and from the sky 
A voice angelic, clear and loud, 
Came searchingly. " Why here delay ? 
Up, Michael ! up ! " it seemed to say. 
"Why Unger thus, with forehead bowed 
And footsteps idle ? Follow on ! 
Somewhere your bells their joyful tone 
Are ringing even now ! Be gone ! 
Seek them afar, and claim your own ! " 

So Michael rose, nor stayed an hour. 
New hope was in his heart ; and power 
To journey, did the need require. 
From the blue skies and silver seas 
Of his own Temperate Italy, 
To where the Tropic's flaming sky 
Unrolled its canopy of fire. 
Or where the desolate Arctic breeze 
Blew cold above the mountains drear 
Of the waste northern hemisphere. 



2i8 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

So seized he in that selfsame day 
His cloak and staff and shallow purse, 
Intent in many a city way, 
And many a hamlet, to rehearse 
The history of his stolen bells, 
The fair and void of parallels ! 

Steadfast he wandered here and there. 
Seeking his darlings everywhere. 
And not alone in Italy, 
Beneath his native skies of blue. 
But where the Jura mountains threw 
Their shadow on Geneva's sea. 
Not up and down the Alps alone. 
And through and through the Apennine, 
But where the Danube and the Rhine 
Upreared their convent-towers of stone. 
Who knew but here, perchance, his bells 
Rang out in grief their stolen tone ! 
"Who knows," he cried, " but here there dwells 
A respite for my grief and pain. 
And here my ears, so weary grown, 
Shall ring with harmony again ! " 
But when he heard the clang and roar 
That echoed up and down the slopes. 
Sounding from many a convent-shrine, 
Vanished again were all his hopes. 
" Alack ! " he sighed, " they are not mine ! " 
His bells revealed their secret lore 
In heavenly harmony ! — but these, 



THE BELLS OF COMO 219 

What ear could deem their notes divine, 
Or call their anthems melodies ! 

The seasons went and came ; and went 
And came again : and still his way 
Across and through the continent, 
Untiringly, from day to day, 
Michael pursued, through cold and heat. 
Through ten, through twenty years, his feet 
Onward unceasingly were bent. 
Far to the East his steps were turned — 
To where on priest-fed altars burned 
Unfading fire ; and to the shrine 
Of Bethlehem in Palestine. 
Even through India and Cathay 
His search unfaltering he made. 
No distance could his zeal evade. 
His chimes seemed never far away : 
On mountain, o'er the desert sand. 
On lake, on river, on the land. 
Ever they sounded loud and clear. 
Ringing triumphant in his ear. 
His form was bent, his beard was gray. 
His wrinkled face was bronzed and burned ; 
But as a traveler in the night. 
Groping, and waiting for the light. 
Yet walking still, so Michael turned. 
And waited for the coming day. 

It was in Greece at last that news 
Was given the wanderer of his bells ; 



220 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Amid the towers and citadels 
Of Athens, where, to pray and muse, 
And stray an hour, and lean upon 
The ruins of the Parthenon, 
Had come at length his weary feet. 
A traveler here he met, replete 
With stories wonderful, who said : 
" Somewhere in yonder Western seas 
I heard their marvelous melodies ! " 
But where, he could not say ; for dead 
Now in his memory the ground 
Where he had listened to their sound. 

But Michael had at least a clue ; 
And hurrying to Italy 
His way he purposed to pursue 
Along the borders of the sea 
Through all the countries of the West, 
And there, God willing, end his quest. 

In a few days his feet had come 
To buried Herculaneum ; 
And when he saw the mountain's brim 
Piercing the cloudrack over him — 
Gazing as with defiant air 
Upon the buried cities there — 
On Michael's burning heart the tears 
Fell thick and fast for wasted years ; 
As on Vesuvius' burning height 
The rain fell hissing in the night. 



THE BELLS OF COMO 221 

Then north, to the unblest estate 
Where ancient Rome sat desolate — 
Discrowned, hke Lear, by daughters she 
Had pampered in prosperity. 
And there, in Rome, at last ! he heard 
The story he so long- had sought. 
He met a mariner, who brought 
The happy, long-expected word, 
That yonder, on the sun-lit shore 
Of Erin there were silver bells. 
So fair and void of parallels 
That he who heard would fain implore 
That he might hear them evermore. 

A month went by. A little bark 
Was moored on Shannon's placid tide. 
A boat was pushing from her side ; 
And o'er the silver wave the dark 
Fantastic turret of Saint Mary's lay, 
Far shadowed by the dropping day. 

Kneeling within the little boat, 
His streaming eyes upon the tower. 
Was Michael. Happy, happy hour ! 
" O bells ! " he cried, " one marvelous note ! 
Long have I sought your sacred glee ! 
Ring out ! ring out, and welcome me ! 
Ring, at the setting of the sun : 
Ring ! and my pilgrimage is done ! " 



222 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

The answer came. A silvery shower 
Burst from the old cathedral tower. 
A smile illumed the wanderer's face : 
His heart sang inward jubilee. 
The bells were his ! and time nor place 
Had marred or dulled their melody. 

But Michael ! — when the rowers sought 
To take in theirs his withered hand, 
And rouse him, as they neared the land, 
They did his guardian angels wrong. 
His soul the seraph-hosts had caught, 
And borne it upward with the song. 
The melody was Michael's knell : 
The anthem was his passing-bell. 



My comrades ! at whose prized command 
I come again a little while 
To greet you, and to take your hand. 
And meet your well remembered smile, 
And read to you, in simple phrase. 
In memory of other days. 
This verse of mine ! — your kindly word 
Of welcoming I gladly heard ; 
And pondering what land, what date, 
What freak of Fortune or of Fate, 



THE BELLS OF COMO 223 

What winter gloom or summer light 
I best might open to your sight, 
I chose this Legend Beautiful, 
Of patience under painful rule, 
Of high response to inward gleam, 
Of consecration to a dream, 
Of eager wandering to find 
A Paradise for heart and mind ! 

To you the legend I relate. 
To you the tale I dedicate. 

You are the Seekers after Good ! ' 
You stand where Greathearts oft have stood ! 
Your lives you dedicate in youth 
To painful — joyful — ^endless search, 
And in the portals of the Church 
Seek Knowledge and Eternal Truth ! 
To-day, of Truth perchance the prize 
You think you hold before your eyes. 
Through care, and toil, and anxious thought, 
The melody you long have sought 
Seems ringing in the sun-lit air ; 
And you are confident, forsooth, 
And " Thus and so," you say, "is Truth ! " 

What shall I say to you .? — Beware .-' 
Clasp not with fervor to your soul 

'See note, page 207. 



224 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

A dream so flattering, so unreal ? 

I would not mock your glad appeal ! 

Far rather would my hand unroll, 

If such were possible, a scroll 

On which were written, " Yea ! your search 

Has led you to the one true Church ! 

Your dream — it is indeed The Truth, 

And you are conquerors ev'n in youth ! " 

Alas ! we know not where it lies. 
It is not ours with seraph's eyes 
To pierce to hidden destinies ! 
We seek, we knock, we vainly call. 
Like Pilate in the council-hall ; 
And still the Christ no answer makes — 
And still the rabble comes and takes 
And carries him without the wall. 

As " Truth " we rear to-day our schemes ; 
To-morrow shows us they are dreams. 
The world's advancing Wisdom creeps 
On strongholds where Tradition sleeps ; 
And walls where Worship thought to rest 
Are rent in twain in Reason's quest. 
The chimes religious awe has reared. 
To alien isles have disappeared ; 
And every solace of the heart 
At times seems summoned to depart. 



THE BELLS OF COMO 225 

What then ! Shall we forbear our toil ? 
Blow out our lamp ? neglect the oil ? 
Repose on some Calypso beach, 
Or to the hall of Circe flee ? 

Good lies not far beyond our reach ! 
We daily hear its melody ; 
It echoes round us, as we go 
Our wondrous pilgrimage ; and though 
Philosophy's high soarings fail, 
And Reason's humbler gropings pale, 
Our souls are born anew each day, 
Still dreaming that beyond the gray 
And distant bound of changing skies, 
Our journey's object waiting lies ! 
We feel a meaning in the hope 
That lures us up the spirit's slope ! 
Somewhere our chimes are ringing still. 
Responsive to our search and will ! 
Before us rise the Hills of Day 
And call us to pursue our way ; 
Love's loftier ranges. Wisdom's seas, 
Forbid our souls to lie at ease. 
We know that Love is Heaven's breath ; 
That Hate and Wilfulness are death ; 
That Aspiration for the Right 
Rewards the eager soul with light. 
So still we follow on To Know ! 
And though indeed no Final Word 



226 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Is ever by the spirit heard, 
Enough is ours of Being's glow- 
To tinge the clouds of life below 
With a serene, refulgent ray 
Betokening a Higher Day. 
A glimmer of the truth we seek 
Life's growing revelations speak. 
And music sweet as Michael's bells 
Man's coming blessedness foretells. 
Happy if even as we die 
We hear, like him, its harmony ! 



ADDITIONAL POEMS 

//. HEART OF YOUTH 



HEART OF YOUTH 

[1881] 

I 

A noontide sun, in early summer-time ; 
Low, billowy summits, in their verdant prime, 
Bounding a valley wide and fair and still : 
And in the midst, the slopes of Walnut Hill.' 

On all the northern hand, — far-reaching, gray, — 
The heights of Winchester, in rude array ; 
And trending east, where lakes like sapphires burn, 
The Fells of Middlesex, embowered in fern. 

Still east, the sea ! a silvery line and thin. 
Hedged by the rocky heights of distant Lynn ; 
And circling nearer — placid as the dead — 
Along whose banks once Paul Revere sped — 
The Mystic's narrow tide, expanding soon 
Into a crystal mere, a broad lagoon. 
Reflecting far, from morn till evening hour, 
Gray Bunker's lofty, sun-illumined tower. 

' The former name of College Hill (Tufts College). 
227 



228 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Southward, the city — dreary desert vast ! . . . 
Haste thee, my verse ! beware the woe ! fly fast ! 
Far, far beyond, see Milton's purple hills. 
The blue-domed range which every bosom thrills ; 
And nearer — where the marbles hide from view 
The ashes of a Sumner and Ballou — 
Fair Auburn, circled by a hundred farms, 
And clasped in sluggish Charles's sinuous arms. 

Westward, the fertile fields of Alewife Brook, 
Laughing with harvests ripening for the hook — 
Flecked by the shadows of vast clouds that float 
Aimless as shipwrecked sails on seas remote — 
Edged by low mountains shimmering in the sun, 
The emerald Heights, far-famed, of Arlington ; 
Enchanted hills, which, when the day is past, 
Are tipt with glory such as Nebo cast 
When angels hastened o'er its darkening crest 
Bearing the Hebrew prophet to his rest ! 

II 

Northward and eastward from this favored scene. 
This Walnut Hill, this college-crowned demesne, — 
Beyond the river flowing at its feet. 
Beyond the stir of village pier and street. 
There winds a road through rarest sylvan ways, 
The ever new delight of summer days. 

Here darkling thickets, densely green, abide, 
Hazel, and oak, and birch, on either side, — 
Where the brown partridge unseen whirrs, and where 
Gray squirrels lurk, and rabbits have their lair. 



HEART OF YOUTH 229 

Here blooms the barberry, in yellow sprays, 

Miles long ! and here, through all the summer days. 

The sweet wild rose and fragrant wilding phlox 

Vie with the garden pinks and hollyhocks 

Which shall be crowned the fairer ! And the prize 

No single wanderer, passing with pleased eyes, 

Withholds from Nature's wilding ones, here strowed 

Luxuriantly. 

. . . Along this sunny road 
Two friends were walking at the noon of day ; 
And both were thoughtful, though they both were gay. 
They both were thoughtful ; but the summer air. 
The sunshine through the branches here and there, 
The laughing bobolink, the cawing crow, 
The blue above, the emerald below. 
Made life that hour so beautiful a dream 
That rustling leaf nor onward murmuring stream 
Could less of sorrow feel, or wild despair. 
Than these companions idly wandering there. 

For both were young ! and in the soul of each 
Were aspirations deeper than all speech : 
Ambitions for the honor which the world 
Stands ready to inscribe on flags unfurled 
In noble causes ; — aspirations, too. 
That honor granted should be honor due. 

They dreamed of sacred fire withheld by Gods : 
They knew of Caucasus, and of the odds 
Prometheus wrestled with, and all his pain ; 
And yet they dared it all, and more, again ; 



230 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

And with the vultures' whirr still sounding nigh 
They dared to rest their ladder on the sky. 

Upon the shore of Time they would not sit. 
The Ocean was before ! and they were knit 
Unto a firm resolve, by faith upheld 
To walk the waters ! If they boiled and welled, 
The way would be more difficult ; if calm, 
The port were sooner reached — the Isles of Palm. 
Nor did they hesitate to point their feet 
To where life's ocean and horizon meet. 

They knew — yet were not daunted — wild with spray 
The vengeful tempest would assail their way. 
They knew men's bones lay bleaching on the sand ; 
They saw the carcasses tossed high on land 
Of earnest voyagers who yesterday 
Had left the beach as buoyantly as they. 
But these (they said) had sailed without a chart : 
Or failed to use it : and the human heart. 
By impulse ballasted, to escape the brine 
A special port must own, and chart divine. 

Ill 
The hemlock crooned for them its friendly strain ; 
And now they turned into a narrow lane 
Half hidden in the leafy underbrush : 
A fragrant avenue, whose sacred hush 
Was broken by the rumble of no wheel, 
No whirl of dust, no echo but the peal 
Of sporting bobolinks ; and where the moss 
A soft rich tapestry spread wide across ; 



HEART OF YOUTH 231 

And all along, as far as eye could reach, 
The birch and hazel boughs and silver beech 
Threw grateful shade. 

"This winding road," said one, 
"Will guide us to the summit ; and the sun, 
Which hitherto hath flamed upon our way 
With scorching heat, will here its fury stay, 
While cooling breezes now will fan our cheek. 
The way is sure : I heard my father speak 
But yesterday of climbing this same path." 

The other lingered, " Greater beauty hath 
The wilding thicket for my mood," said he. 
A dozen rods beyond this sumach-tree 
Sharply the rocky cliff begins to rise. 
Why toil we on ! ' Reward of high emprise ' 
Is here at hand ! Behold ! the forest floor 
Is thick with violets ! and here a door 
Between the maple-trunks seems opening wide. 
Inviting us to enter. In ! " he cried. 
And caught his comrade's arm, and sought 
To lure him. 

But his zeal availed him naught. 

" One moment, brother mine ! " his comrade said. 
" We started out the Overlook's tall head 
Intent to reach. Shall we be baffled here 
By violets .? And yonder buds, I fear. 
Are not the violets your haste has thought. 
Those purple petals, delicately wrought. 
With subtle juices,, poisonous, are filled. 
The deadly nightshade, if your eyes were skilled. 



232 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

You would declare them ! And your open door 
Is blocked with weed and briar. The forest floor 
To which with thoughtless ardor you would haste, 
Look you, is marshy ground — a miry waste." 

" Enough ! " perversely here the other cried. 
" Give over ! Climb your mimic mountain-side ! 
Keep to your rugged pathway if you will : 
The easiest road is soonest up the hill ! 
I shall stop here awhile, among the flowers. 
And rest beneath the trees. In after hours 
I '11 join you on the hilltop's lofty height. 
I know not how I shall ascend, but night 
Will not have fallen ere I join you. Go ! " 

He waited not for answer : but the low 
And sympathetic voice which oft had held 
Him humbled with its music, rose and swelled. 
And broke upon his ear in sweetest tone 
Of friendship, begging, " Venture not alone ! " 
In notes of warning, crying, " Do not go 1 " 

He waited not for answer : but the low 
Wind murmured in his ear, and seemed to say : 
" 'T were better, better, thoughtless youth, to stay ! 
To stay were better ! " And as on he passed. 
Still heedless, — with a deeper, warning blast, 
" Regret is long," it sighed, " and short the day ! " — 
It shouted ! and the woodland echoed, " Stay ! " 

He waited not for answer : but a brood 
Of white-winged doves flew over where he stood. 
Their whirring pinions, as they sped their way. 
Seeming to plead in chorus, " Stay, oh stay ! " 



HEART OF YOUTH 233 

He waited not for answer : in he strode, 
At once his friend forsaking and the road. 
Mindless of all — of pain or torn attire — 
He scrambled through the tangled weed and briar. 
His soul was innocent of thought of ill ; 
His heart, untried, was buoyant ; and his will 
Was steadfast (so he thought) to do the right. 
What matter where he wandered, if the night 
Should not have fallen ere he gained the peak 1 

But surely, so it seemed, across his cheek, 
The winds, which kissed him in the sun-lit way 
Where he before had wandered ; which in play 
Had sported with his hair and fanned his brow, 
Were blowing searchingly and damply now. 
And when he looked, and saw upon his hand 
The stain of crimson drops — a purple brand 
Where briars had punctured ; when he felt the pain, 
At first forgot, now doubly felt again ; 
And glancing down beheld the floss, the burrs 
Thick fastened on him — shaken from the furze : 
Backward he cast a lingering glance, and stood 
As one irresolute. The ground was strewed 
With stubble, crumbling stones, with last year's leaves, 
A vision desolate. As one who grieves 
For pleasures vanished, and would fain return, 
So stood he now, and felt his pulses burn 
With shame that he had wandered from the way. 
Again he heard the wind. It seemed to say, 
" Return ! return 1 you have not wandered far ! " 
Above his head, from out his golden car, 



234 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Apollo, smiling, shone with quickening beam. 

Back wheeled the brood of irised doves, a-gleam 

In every pinion with a golden glow ; 

And circling in the air, above, below, 

"You have not wandered far," they seemed to cry, — 

" Return ! return ! " — then vanished in the sky. 

Again he heard a voice — or seemed to hear. 

Inward or outward, sounding in his ear 

It startled him, as if before his eye 

His friend deserted had come suddenly. 

He listened — turned — had fled the dull abode. 
And in a moment would have gained the road — 
When yonder field again his eye besets, 
The purple field — to him still violets ! 

" I will not go," he cried, — and on his knees 
Down flung himself, — "till I have gathered these ! " 

A stagnant pool was there. It did not flow, 
But moved to right or left as wind might blow ; 
And on its surface curling leaves careered 
And severed lily-pads. Dim, withered, weird, 
A ghostly hemlock-tree and ghastly larch 
Above the margin reared a rugged arch. 
Throwing a slanting shadow on the rank 
Wet deadly nightshade growing on the bank. 

And here the seeker after purple flowers 
Stooped fondly down to while away the hours. 



O hours — O days ! O rapid months and years ! 
O heights ungained ! O unavailing tears ! 



ADDITIONAL POEMS 

///. MISCELLANEOUS 



DAY UNTO DAY 

Half the worth of man's existence 

Is in life's unlooked-for gain. 
Stirs the blood the most in steering 

For the open unknown main. 
Not to solve too soon all knowledge 

Is the child's protective art ; 
To attain new vision daily 

Is eternal youth of heart. 
Oh the beauty of the sunrise ! 

All my being, in its glow, 
Rises, dances, wonders, worships ; 

Yet to-morrow's sunrise-show 
All my spirit is as eager 

Till to-morrow to forego. 

There 's a path on Grand Monadnock 

I have left all unexplored. 
I have scaled the cliffs around it ; 

That its depths with bloom are stored 
I am certain from the fragrance 

Rising free when zephyrs blow ; 
235 



236 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

And in springtime, up its arches, 

I have seen its maples glow. 
But as yet I leave its secret 

Undiscovered to my tread, 
Like a chapter rare and golden 

In a volume still unread ; 
For I know when once I probe it 

All its mystery will have fled. 

There are secret paths of being 

On the spirit's upward way. 
Where, however much the marvel, 

I still hesitate to stray. 
Through life's daily vista gazing 

I at times m.ay catch a gleam 
Of a more than earthly splendor; — 

And the sound as of a stream 
Flowing calmly, grandly, purely 

For the healing of my pain 
May at intervals float downwards 

To my dust-encumbered plain ; — 
But to solve in full the secret 

I 'm not certain would be gain. 



MISCELLANEOUS 237 



WHEN YOUNG HEARTS LOVE 

Bright are earth's days, and glad earth's years, 
When young hearts love ! 
Many are joys, and few are fears, 
When young hearts love ! 
Nor aught the wide earth round. 
Unto its farthest bound, 
May equal the intense 
Unswerving vehemence 
Of faith, of truth, of innocence, of tears, 
When young hearts love ! 

Glad are the songs the angels sing, 
In realms above ! 
Merry the mock-bird's caroling 
In southern grove ! 
But ne'er may seraph chant 
The Song of Covenant 

That bindeth twain in one, 
Or bird of southern sun 
Repeat the soul's glad triumphing. 
When young hearts love ! 



238 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



I FEEL THAT I KNOW HER 

[1876] 

I feel that I know her — we smile as we meet ; 
We pass every day in the very same street, 
She hurrying on — Heaven only knows where, 
And I in pursuit of ambitions of air. 

But who she may be, or the place of her home. 
Or why through the city forced daily to roam, 
Or married or single, a maiden or mother, 
I 'm sure I don't know, any more than another. 

Her eyes are a tender and beautiful blue ; 

Her hair is the glossiest, goldenest hue ; 

Her cheeks are as red as the roses in blow, — 

And her heart is the garden, I feel, where they grow. 

We never have spoken — we smile and go by ; 
No greeting we utter, except with the eye : 
Thank God she is modest, retiring, and true ! — 
And I am as modest and innocent too. 

Full often I wonder her name and her station ; 
I 've known from the first she is foreign by nation. 
Her language — ah me ! would that language were 

mine ! 
The land of her birth is the land of the Rhine. 



MISCELLANEOUS 239 

O Germany ! home of sweet music and song ! 
My feet for thy vine-covered terraces long. 
With Her for a guide through thy sun-purpled air, 
How gladly my heart would go wandering there ! 

Some castle enthroned in thy hills there must be 
That shelter would furnish for her and for me ; 
Some crag overhanging some vine-embowered vale, 
Where beauty might bloom and where love would not 
fail. 

Ah me ! such a spot it were pleasant to see, 
And pleasanter far in its secret to be ! . . . 
Stay, stay, O ye castles and day-dreams so fair ! — 
Ye solace the heart, though but castles in air. 

To-morrow I '11 meet her again ; and her smile 
Will lighten life's roadway for many a mile. 
That face in my dream, were life's journeying done, 
Would lumine the pathway that leads to the sun. 

The end of the roadway will come at the last. 
Our eyes will be dull, and our smiles will have passed ; 
And never, perhaps, will our voices be heard, 
Nor ever our souls by those accents be stirred. 

If true that we Somewhere attain to our own — 
A realm of the heart, though the tongue be unknown — 
We each will discern who the other may be : 
I better know her and she better know me. 



240 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



SWEETEST SONGS ARE NEVER SUNG 

[1879] 

I 

The sweetest songs are never sung — 

So the Poets say. 
The tenderest chords are never strung ; 
The merriest bells are never rung. 

Well-a-day ! Well-a-day ! 
Let the Poets have their way — 
Let them have their way ! 
All that sighing Minstrels sing can never me 
dismay, 
/ can hear sweet bells go pealing — pealing joyously 

to-day ! 
/ can hear their silvery pealing, hear their merry 
roundelay ! 

II 

The fairest pearls are never found — 

So Professors say. 
The cheeriest trumpets never sound ; 
The jauntiest vessels go aground, 

Well-a-day ! Well-a-day ! 
Let Professors have their way — 



MISCELLANEOUS 241 

Let them have their way ! 
All that dull Professors dream can never me 
dismay. 
/ can see staunch ships come sailing — sailing proudly 

up the bay ! 
/ can see their masts all sun-lit on a sky of gold 
and gray ! 

HI 

The saintliest prayer is never said — 

So the Preachers say. 
The daintiest board is never spread ; 
The loveliest maid is never wed. 

Well-a-day ! Well-a-day ! 
Let the Preachers have their way — 
Let them have their way ! 
All that dullard Parsons dream can never me 
dismay. 
/ know fate of lovely maidens — maidens fair and 

sweet as day ! 
/ the loveliest maid in thousands am to bear full 
soon away 1 



242 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



THE SCHOOLMASTER'S DREAM 

Weary with toil at desk and board and book, 
Gladly he dropped the crayon in its nook ; 
But forcing to his lips a kindly smile, 
And touching with soft hand his bell the while, 
Said cheerfully, " The hour to close is nigh : 
The setting sun drops down the western sky. 
To-morrow, with new rest, will come new strength ; 
We reach, perchance, untiring days at length ! " 
Then rang again, and noting the sweet grace 
And eagerness that lit each fair young face, 
Dismissed them all into the evening air 
With fervent blessing and an inward prayer. 

The master's soul was sorrowful with doubt — 
He whose triumphant faith should be so stout. 
His pupils were so sluggish in the arts ! 
They had such feverish and impatient hearts ! 
" O soul ! " he said, " thy toil meets no return. 
Life's cheeriest fires to blackened embers burn. 
No adequate return," again he said. 
And on the desk before him leaned his head. 
The western windows opened to the blue ; 
The sinking sun sent slanting shadows through : 
He saw it not, nor heard the droning flies, — 
But, lulled by Nature's opiate, closed his eyes. 



MISCELLANEOUS 243 

He sees nor hears — his soul's tired pinions sweep 
The shadowy vale of Death's twin-brother, Sleep. 
All day, sad voices, sounding in his ear, 
Had filled his spirit with a nameless fear. 
Surely no followers, in this sunless land, 
Would jeer and beckon him on every hand ! 
But ah ! ev'n here — though with no taunt or shout — 
A myriad spirits thronged him round about ; 
And with a soothing sound, as of a wind 
Low breathing through the fragrant groves of Ind, 
A single Angel — not of gloom, but light — 
Said tenderly, •' O King, thy wrongs recite 1 " 

"Alas, no King," the master said, "am I ! 
Even the crown of laurel-leaves is dry 
Which in my younger years my sister wove. 
Because at college eagerly I strove 
And in the contests bore away the prize 1 " 
" Nay," said the Angel, " principalities, 
States, empires, kingdoms, — these all pass away. 
Forgotten even in an earthly day. 
The crown immortal, the enduring throne, 
These, to be steadfast, must be like thine own ! 
He who the light to one dark soul shall bring. 
Among the sons of men is more than King. 

" No word thou utterest, or good or ill. 
But sounds forever, — wild or soft or shrill, — 
Fast held within the vibrant air's embrace. 
If words of thine shall brighten one sad face, 



244 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Thine accents ease a brother's heavy load, 
Thy daily task reveal where truth is strowed, 
Then rest content ! for there shall come a year, 
In Time's rich flood, when back into thine ear 
With ten-fold power thy words, or ill or good. 
Shall speed with force that may not be withstood. 
Then happy thou, if in thine ear shall ring 
Words that shall crown thee servant, helper, king ! " 

The master smiled. His face with peace was lit 
Where lately pain had overshadowed it. 
" But — sympathy ! " he cried. •' Sweet spirit, stay ! 
Fain would I have some token by the way. 
Daily I toil, nor meet a single smile 
To ease the burden of one lonely mile." 
"Awake ! " the Angel answered, — " thou art blind." 
He raised his head. " Please, sir, we stayed behind, — 
You fell asleep, — you would not wake for us ! " 
(Two little-ones beside his knee spoke thus.) 
" You love us, and try hard, — we know you do ; 
And we have brought this little flower for you." 



MISCELLANEOUS 245 



OLD TIMOTHY JOHN 

AND HIS FREQUENT REFRAIN, " POTATOES ! 
OH, POTATOES ! " 



Not all the heroes of the earth 

Have gained their victory with the sword . 
Not every child of noble birth 

Has borne the escutcheon of a lord. 

Full oft by gray and crupibling tomb, 
By darkling waters' whirling flow, 

May radiant asters beauteous bloom, 
A nd fragrant-everlasting grow. 



Old Timothy John was a marvelous man, 
And always a happy one, too, as he ran 
With load upon load of potatoes. 
" Six dollars, and health, and a hand-cart ! " said he ; 
" Oh, who in the city can wealthier be ! 
Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 

The hush of the morning was stirred by his voice, 
And ever till evening he offered a choice 
Of several kinds of potatoes. 



246 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

" I warrant them sound as a drum ! " cried John — 
"Though this is 'a Jwllozv comparison ' ! 
Potatoes — oh, potatoes!" 

Nor ever a wife or a child had he. 

Poor fellow ! no weight ever lay on his knee 

But a bushel or so of potatoes. 
" My cart is my wife, and my child, and my friend. 
To a family carriage^' said he, " I pretend ! 
Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 

Full certainly Tim was a marvelous man. 
And quite a philosopher, too, as he ran 

Dispensing his stock of potatoes. 
"A pox o' your logic ! " cried moralist John : 
'• Men soon would decease if they didn't live on — 
Potatoes ! Oh, potatoes ! " 

" An' talk o' your ' Nature ' and ' Physics ' ! " said Tim, 
While, staring, his audience looked at him 

And then at his load of potatoes. 
" Ho, ho ! " he said, shoving his cart in the pause, 
" Is n't here an effect that 's ahead o' the cause 1 
Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 

Not much of religion, perhaps, had Tim ; 
But often his measure ran over the brim 

As he sold to the poor their potatoes. 
•' Don't mind the odd nickel," he also would say, 
If he saw they were really ill able to pay. 
" Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 



MISCELLANEOUS 247 

The boys loved his coming ; and often they cried, 
" Oh, please, dear old Tim ! " — so he gave them a ride 

On the top of his load of potatoes. 
The girls loved his coming ; and one, I know, 
Once threw him a kiss — though he called it " a 
blow ! " 
" Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 

Not much of a scholar, perhaps, was he, 
Though seldom he passed in an "X" for a "V" 

As he paid for a load of potatoes. 
"What grammar!'' he cried, when the adding was 

done ; 
" Two tens and a cypher do n't make twenty-one ! 
Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 

No loud politician was honest old Tim, 
Yet no one could purchase a vote of him 

Though they bought his whole load of 
potatoes. 
" I vote for the man the best fitted," said he, 
"And he wouldn't offer a bribe to me. 
Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 

" My choice is the man," cried Timothy John, 

" Who '11 help push the world's great hand-cart on, 

And none o' your ' small potatoes.' 
The man who could purchase my vote when he would, 
Would purchase my liberty, too, if he could. 
Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 



248 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Full certainly Tim was a marvelous man, 
And always a happy one, too, as he ran 

With his lessening load of potatoes. 
He sang from a heart overflowing and free, 
And never mistrusted the universe he. 
" Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 

But Timothy John, a few harvests ago. 
Was noticed as steering unwontedly slow 

With his cargo of new potatoes. 
" Next planting," said he, " I may go under ground- 
The biggest potato the hemisphere round ! 
Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 

Be sure that if Tim has indeed since found 
The Garden where fruits are supposed to abound 

(Though never, perhaps, potatoes), 
His resonant voice will be heard on high. 
And in loftier strains than his own old cry, 
** Potatoes — oh, potatoes ! " 



MISCELLANEOUS 249 



MIDAS AND MUSAGETES 

Up and down the world he goes, 

Poor old fellow, lacking love ! 

Thinking his Parisian glove 
And the pattern of his hose 

All-sufficient to compel 

Man and maid to speak him well. 

Yes, he owns uncounted cash. 
And his rents accrue him much. 
He has had the Midas-touch, 

Getting gold where others trash ; 
Getting everything but play — 
Even getting thin and gray. 

And he really is n't bad — 

Father much the same, you know, 
Mother loving dross and show, 

Ancestors half-ill, half-mad. 
What could best Psychologist 
Hope to grind from such a grist ? 

Well I knew him as a boy : 

Quick to see where he could get 
Half a dime in youthful bet ; 

Slow alone in finding joy — 



250 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Slow in action of the heart : 
Ossified from very start. 

Not till forty-five he wed. 

Each felt each a lucky strike : 
Terms, " Deposit cash alike " ! 

And at fifty she was dead — 

Like their child that came between, 
Crushed in soulless wealth's machine. 

Met we on the street to-day ; 

Dry his smile as long ago. 

"Ah," he said ; "does fount still flow ? 
Has your Muse begun to pay ? 

Million each, for Muses Nine, 

I can cash with single line ! " 

Said I, as he strode along, 

" Dine with me to-night and see ; 
Meet my rosy children three, 

And peruse my latest song. 
It and they will smg away 
All the fever of your day." 

Up and down the world he goes, 

Visits Egypt and Japan, 

Yet is not a happy man. 
Lands of sun or lands of snows 

Immaterial would be. 

Could he sing my songs with me. 



MISCELLANEOUS 251 

MOONLIGHT ON COLLEGE HILL 

[Midsummer, 1879] 

The hour is late : 

Borne up by the weight 

Of the sun as it sank through its western gate, 

The moon has uprisen — full-orbed — sedate ; — 

Has uprisen in glee, 

From the eastern sea ; 

And now with the stars holds jubilee 

On the high wide floor of Immensity. 

As the zephyrs soar, 

Now higher, now lower, 

" Come hither," they call to me o'er and o'er, 

"And wander with us on the reservoir ! " 

I wander — and gaze ; 

And the light wind plays 

With the level waters, and shivers the rays 

That whirl on the surface like fugitive fays. 

The undulant ground. 

For miles around, — 

Rock, river, and valley, and meadow, and mound, — 

Is lit by the moon with light profound. 



252 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

White radiance stains 

Roofs, towers, and vanes, 

And the moonlight gleams on the college panes 

Like dew on the grass after summer rains. 

The river below 

Drifts pale as snow, 

And over its current, as airs soft blow, 

Broad ripples of silvery frost-work go. 

Down miles of stream, — 

A faint, far gleam, — 

The harbor glows, till its waters seem 

A jasper haze in a Patmian dream. 

There bridges four. 

Time-shaken and hoar. 

Stand trembling in constant Traffic's roar. 

And fade in the gloom of the farther shore. 

There, too, on their trips 

'Twixt the ferry-slips. 

Go dragons with flame that flares and dips, — 

Black shuttles in Trade's Apocalypse. 

On the neighboring hill, — 

Dim, lonely, and still, — 

The powder-house echoes, with babblings shrill, 

The wail of the plaintive whip-poor-will ; 



MISCELLANEOUS 253 

Still proudly it stands, 

O'erlooking the lands 

Where Washington toiled with his patriot bands 

And threw up redoubts with his own white hands. 

And here is the road 

Where the steed once strode — 

The moon still gleaming as then it glowed, 

Though the tide of a hundred years has flowed — 

On which Paul Revere, 

In hope and fear, 

Rode sounding aloud in the nation's ear 

The knell of the British grenadier. 

In my walk I stay, 

And the scene survey 

With a startled eye ! for I hear a sway 

As of hurrying hoof-beats far away ! 

But I listen again : 

And my ears attain 

No sound but the sudden and sad refrain. 

And the patter and splash, of summer rain, — 

As up from the west, 

At the storm's behest, 

Dark shadows rise wild o'er the landscape's breast, 

Blotting moon, river, harbor, and all the rest. 



254 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



COLLEGE HILL 

One thought to-day, and one alone, 
Has filled the circle of my mind : 
And fairer sunbeam never shone 

On eyes that long had wandered blind. 
My heart to-day, with happy thrill. 
Has been with thee, O College Hill ! 
With thee, with thee, 
O College Hill ! 

The thunder of far Alpine Hills, 

The storm-cloud of the Southern Seas, 
The murmur of Spain's murmuring rills, — 

Of these I 've dreamed, nor dreamed of ease. 
But happiest thoughts my bosom fill 
Whene'er I turn, O College Hill, 
To thee, to thee, 

O College Hill ! 

The room grows wide wherein I sit : 

These narrow city walls expand : 
I see again thy robin flit, 

I see thy lawns on every hand, — 
As green, as vocal, as the rill 
That danced adown the sacred hill 
Of Helicon, 

O College Hill ! 



MISCELLANEOUS 255 

I see thy rising slopes, thy halls. 

O Mother Earth, thou 'rt greener there ! 
And gentler be the rain that falls, 
And sweeter, balmier be the air, 
Forever, and forever still, 
Upon thy breast, O College Hill ! 
On thy loved breast, 

O College Hill ! 

Again I seem to see thy trees — 

Thy silver-maple, mountain-ash ; 
And dearer to my heart are these 
Than Eastern vine or calabash ! 
I would not part with these, to till 
By fair Euphrates, College Hill ! 
Or Gihon's edge, 

O College Hill ! 

Again I see — more blest than all — 

Full many a dear, remembered face ; 
Again I hear the laugh, the call, 

The cheer that rang from place to place : 
The laugh and cheer that echo still 
About thy halls, O College Hill, 
Could I but hear, 

O College Hill ! 

Again, in thought, T grasp the hand 

Of comrades north and southward gone. 



256 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

I follow them ! and in the land 

Of Danube, Rhine, and Amazon 
Again I feel the electric thrill 
I knew on thee, O College Hill, 
When hand clasped hand 
On College Hill ! 



SONNETS 



IN A COUNTRY BURIAL-GROUND 

I lingered in the wayside home of rest. 
Enchanted by the dream of peace it wore. 
** G. L, — Eighteen " : the marble told no more 
Which marked the turf-mound where I stood a 
guest. 

A hundred times, perchance, the robin's nest 
Has swung above his dust, while, o'er and o'er, 
The timothy and sorrel locked the door 
Which shuts him safe within his chamber blest. 



MISCELLANEOUS — SONNETS 257 

Dear sleeper ! was it ruthless War's alarm — 
Its demon sacrifice — which in thine hour 
Of blithesome strength compelled thee to the tomb ? 

Or deed of love to save another's harm ? 

Thou answerest not ! contented with thy bower 
And ever wearing youth's transcendent bloom. 



LOVE'S PREDICAMENT 

In loving I do find such sweet employ 

That more of love I make each hour my quest. 

Yet presently I find this puzzling joy : 

Am I Love's servitor — or Love's dear guest ! 

For while in strowing of my love I live, 

No less of love remains to quench love's thirst ; 
In truth, to strow is gain, for though I give, 
Beseems more love is mine than mine at first. 

Shall I then cease to love, and so give more .■* 
Deny myself, and let the world have all ? 
So be it ! Self I '11 hide behind Love's door, — 
Enswathe me fondly in Love's blindfold pall. 

Oh, reckless venture ! for thus love I most. 

And Love, thrice over, beams my smiling host. 



258 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



PENALTY 

What, little Golden-hair ! — upon my knee 

Hast thou thus clambered and purloined a kiss ? 
Must I from noonday's transient slumber-bliss 
Be wakened by such artful villainy ? 

And now thou smilest, hinting I should be 
Joyed at thy stealing, and accept submiss 
This theft of riches from fond love's abyss, 
I all-unconscious ! Nay, a penalty ! 

Meet justice as transgressor ever heard 
Do I impose on thee, thus flagrant caught. 
Lift up, red lips ! receive this judgment-lore : 

Lo ! for thy guilt I sound the ancient Word, 
** If from thy neighbor thou hast taken aught, 
Fourfold in similar thou shalt restore." 



TO THE MUSE, AFTER SILENCE 

Is yet my penance ended .-' Will the Muse, 
Against whom I offended, come once more 
And dwell with me, and bless me as of yore ? — 
Fondly, as erst, caress me .'' radiant hues 

Of gracious dawn throw o'er me ? magic dews 
Of heavenly peace outpour me } Oh, the store 
Of loftiest soul-uplifting, when heart's door 
Lies open, and Song's gifting lore ensues ! 



MISCELLANEOUS — SONNETS 259 

Then come to me, Divine One ! Lo, I kneel 

-Humbly where knelt I oft to know thy kiss. 

How have I lived, not having touch of thee ! 
Even as sinking swimmers when they feel 

Shore's sands beneath them, welcome I this bliss. 

Thy strength supports — exalts — makes much 
of me. 



"GOOD-BYE" 

I love the early meaning of the phrase — 

It takes all sting of sadness from the word. 

Leaving it blithe as carol of a bird 

When golden twilight shuts the summer days. 
Not "lost," not "severed" — nay, not these the rays. 

Like dying planet's, when " Good-bye " is heard ; 

But " Good-be -with-ye ! " — as when heavens are 
stirred 

To rosy tints invoking hearts of praise. 
O love, dear love ! I bid you not farewell ! 

O friend departing, still we are akin ! 

O parent, wheresoe'er your pathway fares ! 
The night descends, but like a silver bell, 

Reverberant eternal depths within. 

Your sweet " Good-bye " unmeasured blessing bears. 



26o ADDITIONAL POEMS 



REBIRTH 

No recollection have I that I asked 

To join this human caravan's sad toiling ! 

Yet erst I may have lived ; — 'neath sky as broiling 

As this to-day, I may have wept or basked. 

If so it were, and I were oft o'ertasked, 

As now and here, and weary with earth's moiling, — 
Love's loftiest works oft finding naught but 

foiling, — 
Could I my dread of birth renewed have masked ? 

Yea, truly I believe I should have cried : — 
" Dear Mother Nature, thee I still will trust ! 
If thou hast need of me, still let me serve ! ". . . 

So, being here, my heart I have applied 

To give Man's hopes and aims an upward thrust, 
And charm dull Chaos into Beauty's curve. 



ADDITIONAL POEMS 

IV. TIMES AND SEASONS 



FOR A BIRTHDAY 

I keep no reckoning of the Years 

As they pass by. 
Life's seasons, with their smiles and tears, 

Unnumbered fly. 
So whether twenty be the score — 
Or twenties two — or three — or four — 

Still young am I ! 

But ah ! the Days are mine to hold 

In loving fee. 
And all their richness I am bold 

To feel and see. 
I hail each morn the added round, 
And in their wealth to-day is found 

This thought of thee ! 

Couldst thou but gain the good I pray, 
My prayers might cease : 

Thy Birthday would become a day 
Of heart's release. 

Not wealth nor honors wish I thee — 

But loftier wish : that thou mayst be 
With self at peace ! 
261 



262 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



MERRY CHRISTMAS 

In the roar of the world's busy hive 
There is better for some than to " thrive." 
There are songs in the chill winter air ; 
They summon to do and to dare : — 
" Peace on earth unto men of good will ! " 
Above all the pain and the ill, 
Merry Christmas ! 

O prophet who voiced the high dream 
That had birth beside Galilee's stream ! 
The cross was not far from the song, — 
And the thorns to high dreams still belong ! 
But the peace, the exuberant thrill 
In the soul of all men of good will — 
This makes Christmas ! 



"THEN FELT I LIKE SOME 

WATCHER OF THE SKIES" 

[Christmas, 1905 ] 

A Star, you say ? 
Oh, yea ! 
A star of love and light 
That rose in Nazareth that far-off time ! 
And, piercing earth's dull night, 
Lured selfishness away, — made brotherhood sublime. 



TIMES AND SEASONS 263 

Before that day ? 
Oh, yea ! 
Rare souls of inward flame 
From age to age resplendent rose and gleamed, 
Uplifting human aim, 
Illumining with gold man's skies that grewsome 
seemed. 

Earth still is gray ? 
Oh, yea ! 
But stars of love and life 
Still rise wherever noble souls aspire, — 
Transfiguring hate and strife. 
Redeeming sordid earth with their exalting fire. 

Strive we as they ? 
Oh, yea ! 
Be each a luring orb, 
With rays outflashing for poor human eyes, 
Till love all wrong absorb, 
And round the illumined earth Good Will indeed 
arise. 



264 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



BON VOYAGE 

Over the Ocean ! The waters are blue ; 

Joy to the ship, friend, — and blessing to you ! 

Days of deep calm on the wave are before you ; 

Here is our hope that with health they may store you ! 
Over the Ocean to wonderful shores ! 
Voyager, voyager, marvelous doors 
Swiftly shall open their lures to your sight, — 
Dawnings of Italy, Syrian night ; 
And never a door but our wishes pass through. 
That good, as each swings, may be waiting for you ! 

Over the Ocean to wonderful lands ! — 

Blessing, O friend, from these stay-at-home hands 

Follows you all the mysterious track. 

Wishing you peace till you turn to come back. 
Then with your vision adance with the glow 
Of Germany's vineyards and Switzerland's snow, 
Dear to our hearts shall again be your homing. 
Rich with your harvest of rest and of roaming. 

Voyager ! is there a voyage mysterious 
Waiting ahead for us all — more imperious. 
Vaster in might than all voyages here ? 
Up with the anchor ! Forth valiantly steer ! 



TIMES AND SEASONS 265 



DEATH OF MY FRIEND: THE 
OLD YEAR 

[December 31, 1878] 

What ! is that good Year dying ? — 
The Year that has done so much for me ? 
That so often has had a kind touch for me ? 

Out in the cold there, dying ? — 
Poor Year ! what a sorrowful end for thee ! 
But the host thou hast blest will stand friend 
for thee ! 

What ! is never a mourner wailing ? — 
Is the whole wide hemisphere rollicking ? 
The world with a foundling frolicking ? 

Old Year, there surely is wailing ! — 
My heart in its gratitude sings for thee ! 
My tongue this high requiem rings for thee ! 



266 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



EASTER 

Beauty for ashes forever the planet puts on ! 
Blossoms and birdlings and brooks when the winter 

is gone ! 
Rise, O my soul, to the Easter without and within ; 
Flee from life's bareness and weakness and selfhood 

and sin. 
Live with the lavish forthspending of Nature at play ; 
Fling on the path of thy fellows some luminous ray. 
Sleep not while War and Oppression hold nations in 

woe ; 
Wide in the furrows of Man seed regenerate sow. 
Listen ! the song of Humanity's springtime is near ! 
Join in the chorus sublime which the race yet shall 

hear. 
Laugh like the sun, sound the bobolink's jubilant 

cry : 
This shall be Easter full-bloom, fit for earth or for 

sky. 



ADDITIONAL POEMS 

V. OCCASIONAL AND PERSONAL 



IN GRATEFUL LOVE 

[Dedication of a volume of poems, 1880] 

To her whose sympathetic heart 

hath been my stay ; 
Whose gentle hand hath guided me 

in all my way ; 
Whose teachings in my childhood's hours 

were love alone ; 
Whose arms of counsel now in youth 

are round me thrown ; 
To her whose bright example is 

my guiding star ; 
Whose love and faith are firmer than 

the hills afar ; 
Whose presence hovers o'er me like 

some holy dove — 
To HER these little songs are given, 

in grateful love. 



267 



268 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



TO MY CHILDREN ON THEIR 
MARRIAGE DAY 

An old Italian story tells 

Of strife of town with town, 

Where men of valor, for their homes, 
Laid life in honor down. 

One morn a youth with head unclad, 

In scorn of helmet's guard. 
Went forth to fiercest fight, and yet 

At night returned unscarred. 

" How dar'dst thou, youth, without thy mail, 

Adventure on the field ! " — 
" My parent kissed me on the brow : 

That kiss was helm and shield ! " 



My children ! starting forth this hour 
On life's untraveled ways. 

Receive a parent's kiss, as guard 
Against all evil days. 

'T is magic on the field of right, 
A shield in all you do. 



OCCASIONAL AND PERSONAL 269 

Accept it, — you remain unscath'd ! 
It means, " I trust in you ! " 

'T is mighty too on plains of grief, 

If burdens you endure. 
Recall it, — sorrows lose their sting ; 

It means, " My love is sure ! " 

A kiss ? — a helmet and a shield ! 

I give it as we part ; 
Oh, wear it as a charm and balm 
'Gainst every earthly dart. 



"LOOK BACK AT TIMES" 

Each morn, along the dewy street. 
As cityward I went, 
"Part way " with me her eager feet 
My little daughter bent. 

Then, as I hastened from her side. 
And fast the distance grew, 
" Look back, look back at times ! " she cried, 
" I '11 wave my hand to you ! " 

Look back ? Ah, little did we think 

Her phrase of childhood love 
In after years my food and drink — 

My soul's delight — would prove. 



270 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

Unmeasuredly I now rejoice 

In that blest earlier day ; 
Nor need I now to hear her voice 

Her summons to obey. 

Yea, oft, my child, I backward look, — 
Again those years are mine ; 

Their pages are my Golden Book 
With legends all divine. 

Within its leaves, as in a dream, 

Dear visions come and go. 
Like walks in Fairyland they seem. 

And ever sweeter grow. 

Your baby hand still clasps my own, 

Your kiss is on my cheek. 
Though more than twenty years have flown 

Their blessing grows not weak. 

O vanished darling 1 — still my pride ! — 
Where roam your feet to-day .-' 

Forever young your years abide. 
Though mine are flecked with gray. 

Forever young abide her years — 

Yea, all immortal she ! 
And still — the balm for all my fears — 

She waves her hand to me. 



OCCASIONAL AND PERSONAL 271 



OUT OF THE DISTANCE 

[To one who sent me spring blossoms from the banks of the 
Fox River, IlUnois. — 1890] 

A hand from out of the distance reached, 
And practiced what I had often preached. 

That hand ? It was the hand of one 
Who often fair deeds of good hath done, 
Though always with sweet unconscious grace, 
Like violets in some greenwood place. 

That distance ? 'T were thousand miles if I ran — 
But heart can o'erleap it in moment's span ! 
That distance ? The soul is unmindful of space : 
I dream I am there, and I see face to face. 

That preaching ? High word of Man's greatness it 

taught ; 
And " Scatter fair blossoms ! " — this bidding it brought. 
And she the high message with fervor received, — 
Then showed by her life she its Gospel believed ! 

Fair blossoms, I bless you ! You bring to me peace. 
Your fragrance, deep hid in my heart, shall not cease. 
You bear me on wings to loved river and dell, 
And the Voice of the ^ons you whisper : " 'T is well ! " 

O hand that out of the distance reached. 

To me and my soul you have more than " preached." 



272 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



UP HIGHER 

[Acceptance of an invitation. — July, 1890] 

Brother and Lover ! whom I soon shall see : 
Whose call I follow to learn liberty ! 
The noon-day terror calleth me on wings 
To where the pine upon Monadnock sings. 
I toil and sweat, as thou amid the hay, 
But lack what gives the beauty to thy day — 
Fragrance of clover, coolness in the deeps 
Beneath low branches where the long grass creeps, 
And most of all, the high horizon's rim, 
Where cloudy summits, swathed in beauty, swim. 

Spirit of Nature ! who to me art peace 1 
Happy when thou for me dost speak release, 
And with the call from lowlands by the sea, 
" Child, come up higher ! " mak'st me once more free ! 

Yea, come up higher ! where the mountain's crown 
Is kissed by coolness as the night sweeps down ; 
Where darting dragon-fly and cawing crow 
Alike the wholesome life of Nature know, — 
Unbound by sorrow, and unstained by wrongs 
Which in the human world drown angels' songs. 



OCCASIONAL AND PERSONAL 273 

Ah, is it not a wretched daily plight 
That with our scheming we hide heavenly light ! 
We deem our petty plans shall scale the skies ; — 
We know not we are blinding our own eyes 
To sights and sounds and spiritual worth 
A myriad times surpassing those of earth. 

Up higher, then, indeed ! And as my feet 
Shall shake from them the dust of city street, 
May mind and soul both likewise open fair 
To hints of spirit's intellectual air. 
Up higher not alone from sea to hill. 
But higher to the highest heights of Will ; 
Up higher to the peace beyond all strife, 
Up higher to the true eternal life. 



274 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



" SEVENTY " 

[ Written of James Vila Blake, and printed and sent by friends 
to many other friends, on his birthday. — 191 2 ] 

Did some one say " Seventy " ? — there 's surely mis- 
counting ! 

Some joker with match sent the mercury mounting ! 

Hang Vila's thermometer free from caloric, 

Then fifty degrees would show all that 's historic. 

Observe his spry gait, and his labors incessant : 

A boy is thus active — old age is quiescent. 

His ease of production shames motors and horses — 

Four dramas a year and full forty discourses ! 

Young fellows of thirty, and even of twenty, 

Are slow when compared with his swiftness and 
plenty. 

Those lines are not wrinkles — they 're records of 
laughter 

And symbols of friendships that came trooping after. 

That crown is not snow which at times paints him 
sober ; 

It 's blossoming clematis — best in October. 

The " old " stop at home, and complain if in motion : 

He leaps o'er the Rockies and swims o'er the ocean. 

And just grasp his hand — does it feel at all icy .? 

His greeting, health, wit, are alike warm and spicy. 



OCCASIONAL AND PERSONAL 275 

In fact, we must " play " he no longer is youthful 
If now, while we celebrate, we would be truthful ! 
So why, after all, should we go through the motion 
Of trying to magnetize only a notion ? 
To me it seems wiser to wish him some shirking. 
With will to decrease his obsession for working. 
Alas ! such discretion comes only with aging, 
And Vila each month starts afresh, with new paging ! 
The worst of it is, he will never be older ; 
Each added ten years sees him younger and bolder. 
We simply "accept " him, his wisdom and folly. 
To hang in our hearts as we hang Christmas holly : 
The green is for gladness though earth is in bleak- 
ness, 
The berries for blessings bestowed on our weakness. 
'Tis thus we enshrine him — a blessing of bringing — 
And vision him ever as childlike and singing. 
Rare spirits like Vila from youthtime don't sever ! 
A sweet-hearted boy, he '11 stay youthful forever. 



276 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

SONNETS 



MOTHER AND CHILD 

Beneath the arbored grapevine's golden shade 
We upward gazed together — she and I ! 
The clustered fruit seemed hung as on the sky ; 
Beyond my utmost reach it glowed and swayed. 

But she was tall as lovely, and her aid 
Upbore me to the triumph. Lifted high, 
I plucked the purple globes with gladsome cry. 
And in her arms a feast of Eden made. 

Perpetual o'er me since that childhood rare, 
Dear gracious spirit vanished now afar. 
Have swayed high fruits you showed to be desired ; 

And if, ascending through celestial air, 

My soul perchance at times has grasped a star, 
'Twas still by you my upward aim was fired. 



PERSONAL SONNETS 277 



TO JAMES VILA BLAKE 

[ Printed, and sent by certain friends to many other friends, on 
his birthday. — 1905 ] 

Poet of lofty thought and artist sight, 

Musician keen, whose ears catch dulcet notes. 
Wise essayist, whose dullest page is bright, 
Sane critic — seeing suns, ignoring motes ; 

Preacher whose finest texts are writ in deeds, 
Impelling nobleness in young and gray ; 
Teacher whose art allures from listless meads 
To heights where Song and Masque hold purest 
sway; 

More than all these, rich lover and rare friend, 
A thousand times sweet friend and lover true ! — 
Small weight a world's admiring praise could lend 
Of worth or grace to helper such as you. 

Bays are not theirs alone whose deeds men laud ; 
Wreaths greenest are still theirs whom few applaud. 



278 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



IN QUEST TO KNOW 

[Dedication of "The Complete Life," a small volume of moral 
essays, " To my friend and fellow-explorer, Harold Eddowes, in 
grateful memory of many happy afternoon rambles, in summer and 
in winter (1884-1887), about Fox River valley, Illinois, during which 
— 'exploring Nature ' both outwardly and inwardly — we talked not 
seldom of matters such as those treated of " in the book named. — 
1888] 

Oh, who shall say, my brother and my friend, — 
Shall e'er again our feet together hie ? 
Oh, blest the woodlands, blest the peaceful sky 
Where oft we two, light-hearted without end, 

Our eager way, as children might, would wend ! 
The first spring flowers were those which met our 

eye; 
The hurrying, road-edged river running by 
Ne'er failed us once — its every nook and bend 

Fresh corners offered for our search and growth. 
But years are flying — though they still are grand ! 
Be ready, friend ! Ere long, perchance, we go 

A farther road than any, where we both 
May solve the mystery of some other land, 
And wander joyous still, in quest To Know. 



PERSONAL SONNETS 279 



AT SPRUCE -TREE' 

[June, 1912] 

How often, in my dreams of Treetop Land, 
It rose an Eldorado — Land of Gold ! 
How often did my eager wish expand 
To what the hearts that loved it had foretold ! 

And now within its woodlands I have roamed. 

Its grassy, cloistered fields my feet have pressed ; 
And while its wind-swept greenness round me 

foamed, 
Its giant spruce-tree has been made my nest. 

What Eldorado of the passing years 

E'er kept so well its promise to the soul ! 
How oft they brought but disappointing tears 
In place of riches as the longed-for goal ! 

But here are beauty, freshness, life, and friends. 

The richer ownership the more one spends. 



' The name given by Colonel Daniel Crosby Pearson to his 
summer home in Candia, New Hampshire. The great, wide-spreading 
spruce-tree, with its hammock "nest," in front of the house, towers 
to a height of sixty feet or more. 



28o ADDITIONAL POEMS 



GOD'S MARINERS 

[Printed in Unity, Chicago, in celebration of its Twentieth 
Birthday, March 3, 1898] 



Twenty Years Past 

A voyage such as vessel never knew, 

Forth-starting on a cruise but dimly planned, 
Provisioned meagrely, though ably manned, 
And steadfast, as each heavenly beacon grew 

Revealing whither — through horizons new ! 

A course with rocks and shoals on every hand, 
And leading, some have feared, to No-Man's- 

Land ! — 
Though ever overhead the heavens were blue ! 

Yea, and God's winds have kissed the prow through 
all. 
Till crew and steersman feel the chilly air 
Grow warm at last, and thus have strength to cope 

With what may yet remain of tidal wall. 
Far in the wake has faded Point Despair ; 
Yonder, ahead, looms up the cape. Good Hope. 



OCCASIONAL SONNETS 281 

II 

Twenty Years to Come 

On shore — oh, hungry eyes with yearning gaze ! 
On shore — oh, eager and beseeching cries ! 
" Sail on, you sailors, where high dreams arise," 
They call, " and bring us to the better days ! 

We droop amid these sordid works and ways. 
Where social greed, and hungering for the skies. 
Becloud men's sight to Being's loftiest prize ! 
Sail on, till entered are God's palm-fringed bays !" 

Yea, gallant barque ! though twenty years you sail, 
Add twenty more, and twenty more to that, 
And hungry eyes on shore shall follow still ! 

For yet shall spirits faint, and faces pale. 

And many a human dream fall prone and flat, 
Ere we have fathomed truly God's high will. 



282 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



THE LOYAL TRAITOR 

[To Raymond L. Bridgman, author of the novel with the 
title, " Loyal Traitors." — 1903 ] 

" He means it well," with smile (or frown) they say, — 
" But, lack ! he carries his * reform ' too far. 
One fails of wisdom who o'erleaps the bar 
Which prudent hands have stretched athwart the 
way. 

A yard or two if you would run, you may : 
But if you race to lengths unpopular 
Your zeal offends. Who would his cause not jar, 
In reason's middle vantage-ground must stay." 

Oh, weak, who make a " middle ground " for Right ! 
And doubly weak who, seeing valor wield 
The axe to topple Wrong, would dull the blade ! 

Who loves his land, against that land must fight 
If she be tyrant ; — traitor if he yield 
While prostrate Liberty is bound and flayed. 



REDEEM YOURSELF, O LAND! 

[1903] 

" For what avail the plow or sail, 
Or land or life, if freedom fail ? " 

— Emerson. 

America, you need fraternal sight ! 

The man or State that lives to self alone 
Acquires no record on enduring stone 
Enwreathed with amaranth, with laurel dight. 



OCCASIONAL SONNETS 283 

Redeem yourself, O Land ! Remove the blight 
You fasten on the brave, whose valiant tone 
Through tyrant years has made their passion known 
For liberty and larger love and right. 

Alas, how meagre just to offer bread ! — 

And yet their wounds we still must strive to heal, 
Must recompense with good their fearful ill. 

Nor is it yet too late to crown their dead — 
To snatch their banner from our chariot-wheel 
And raise it upon Freedom's holy hill. 



FIVE TIMES 

[1898 -1903] 

Five times the sun his all-forgiving course 

Has rounded since the strife and tears began. 
It never entered darkest dream of man 
That Liberty's sweet fountain at its source 

So long should sullied be ; that Greed and Force 
Should march victorious in Mercy's van, 
Eclipse the strength the world rejoiced to scan, 
And face us back to Russian and to Norse. 

Alas ! we cannot raise the countless dead : 

The mango moans above them. Yet take heart ! 
Their dream may yet irradiate their shore ! 

Or shall we still, with Freedom's spirit fled, 
Refuse to recognize our holy part, 
And in Repentance' face still shut the door ? 



284 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

FINISHED 

[Epilogue to a collection of poems. — December, 1880] 

The year is finished — finished is the book. 

The year was full of days, for good or ill. 

It summoned us the fleeting hours to fill 

With noble deeds. Long hours in dale and nook, 
Where haunted pines their odorous needles shook, 

Where fern and flower their dewy fragrance spill, 

It gave for our delight. 'T is dying ! Still, 

New years remain ! With fervor let us look 
To make them really ours. — And you, my page ! 

As years are full with hours, so you with songs ! 

Oh, happy I if on your friendly way 
You give, perchance, to eager youth and age 

Some sight of largeness that to life belongs. 

Some vision luring to a better day. 



ADDITIONAL POEMS 

VI. IN MEMORIAM 



THE DEAD STUDENT' 

[1882] 

I 
With hearts enchained, and grateful, keen delight, 

We gazed into the mid-September sky ; — 
A new star, then un-named, intense and bright. 

Rising, had met our eye. 

Nightly we watched the fair, ascending orb, 
More beautiful, more luminous each hour. 

Never did other sun our souls absorb 
With more supernal power. 

Six fleeting months it gleamed — until its rise 
Was looked for, and we grew to love its beams. 

And then — as suddenly as the swift lightning flies. 
As break the mountain streams — 

' Wentworth Brooks Robbins, aged 19 : a student at Tufts College. 

285 



286 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

There loomed a cloud above the horizon's bar, 
Which, while we groaning gazed into the night, 

Enshrouded all the scene, and hid the star 
Forever from our sight. 

And hid the star ? Yea, hid to outward gaze, 
Though still in dreams it in full beauty glows, 

Gleaming with richer, more refulgent rays 
Than when it first arose. 

II 

Upon the surface only, wild with glee, 

The white waves dance with all the winds that blow ; 
They only learn the secrets of the sea 

Who fathom far below. 

To those who knew him least, he may have seemed — 
That comrade whom with many tears we mourn — 

Like one who lived for sport ; who never dreamed 
He for aught else was born. 

You never knew him as you should have known. 
You who would judge him with a judgment thus : 

A tenderer heart throbbed never than his own, 
Nor more magnanimous. 

And not in vain he lived, though brief his day. 

His blithesome heart oft stole away our care ; 
Long in our lives his influence will stay, 

Blessing us unaware. 



IN MEMORIAM 287 

III 
The April morning wore a cloudy veil ; 

Across the mountain-tops gray vapors passed. 
Weeping for him who prostrate lay and pale, 

The sleet and rain fell fast. 

But with the noon the sky no longer grieved, 
The sunlit earth grew luminous and bright ; 

Even the upheaved sod — for him upheaved — 
Grew golden in the light. 

With slow sad steps we bore him to the grave, 
While on his pall the flowers and smilax lay ; 

And wept we that a soul like his should have 
No longer life than they. 

But beautiful it was, if he must die, 

To reach his rest in such a time and scene, 

Mourned by such tender love, and brought to lie 
Beneath such sky serene. 

And there we left him — where he oft had roved 
To greet at morn each mountain's purple dome; 

In constant sight of the dear hills he loved, 
His happy summer home.' 



' Keene, New Hampshire ; Grand Monadnock and other summits 
rising a few miles away. 



288 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



LEWIS G. JANES' 

[Read at the Memorial Service at the Ole Bull Studio House, 
Cambridge, September 8, 1901 ] 

Not waiting for the evening's shades to swell, 
Sometimes at noon she rings her curfew-bell — 
The solveless Mother of whose "hours " we prate, 
Though in her years is neither soon nor late. 
But though his dust lies now amid the flowers. 
His thought persists — his living words are ours. 

His living words are ours, and show the way 
To Freedom and to earth's more glorious day ; 
His potent words — with manly impulse fraught, 
And pointing to the ever-widening Ought ! 
His solvent words — with Nature's meaning rife, 
And throbbing with the true eternal life. 

He asked the universe for what it had, 
And held its tenure to be good, not bad. 
In ferns and fauna he read things To Be ; 
The stars held strains of secret minstrelsy. 
He loved her much, and Nature did not mock, 
But fed him manna even from the rock. 

But higher yet he sought his loftier theme. 
And roved in earth's best groves of Academe. 

' 1844- 1901. President of various scientific, ethical, and literary 
societies ; author, lecturer, philosopher. 



IN MEMORIAM 289 

The wisdom of the Past he made his own — 
Whatever man had dreamed, or guessed, or known, 
And with the scholar's grace and sage's art 
Laid bare its promise for the human heart. 

Around his board he gathered with dehght 
The dusky face with Eastern radiance bright. 
The traveled seer from Europe's groaning lands, 
The Islander outstretching hopeful hands ; 
And from the lips of each and all he heard 
The world's one searching, all-embracing Word. 

That Word was Freedom ! and he sought to trace 
How freedom might be won for all the race. 
For him no freedom was while some were bound ; 
Freedom meant Freedom all the world around. 
So, foremost still, his Word to us comes down : — 
Freedom for all men, white or black or brown. 

And not alone his living word was high : 
His word was lofty when he came to die. 
He spoke of beauty, whispered of the light. 
And full of courage entered on the Night, 
Content to know whatever lay before 
Would be in line with Nature's finest store. 

His dying word — " Still beauty reigns on earth : 

Let beauty also in the soul have birth ! " 

His dying word, so like his own rich life, 

That sought the noble, shunned the needless strife, 

And by his public voice and private pen 

Brought strength and beauty to the lives of men. 



290 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

O steadfast soul ! in whatsoever star 

Or realm of ether thou to-day afar 

Dost wander, — or unseen beside us stand, — 

The world still hears thine accents of command ; 

And as a ripple widens o'er the sea, 

So yet shall spread thy faithful ministry. 



ADONIRAM JUDSON PATTERSON 

1827 - 1909 

Faithful follower of good, 

Freeman when the world was slave ; 
Modest where self-seekers stood, 

Only first in strife to save ! — 
Luminous, to seeing eye, 
Soars thy spirit to the sky. 

Weep we not that thou hast won 
Rest at last from body's thrall ; 

Thus serenely sinks the sun. 
Answering to Nature's call. 

Soul and sun ! what warmth and light 

Wrought ye both, ere came the night ! 

Feeble to thy sight and hand 

Were the prizes men might show ; 

Only proud wast thou to stand 

Where Truth's summons called to go. 

Humbly one of kindred pride 

Lays this laurel at thy side. 



ADDITIONAL POEMS 

VII. EARLIER PIECES 



CONCORD RIVER 

My soul to-day, 
O river, wandering seaward. 
Is with thee ! 
From out the gray 
Of Memory — hurrying leeward 
Radiantly, 
As in a dream 
Of friends dead or at a distance, 
I behold 
Your fair, faint gleam ; 
And for your glad existence, — 
Gay with gold 
As where there waits 
Eternal sunrise Yonder 
At the gates 
Of sapphire, — I 
A grateful prayer do ponder, 
Tremblingly. 

291 



292 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

O strange, O mystic stream ! 

Slow winding to the sea : 
Oft in my nightly dream 
Your vision comes to me ! 
Within my slumber I behold your placid wave, 
And look with joy on your unruffled sweep ; 
And with the answering smile I crave 
You smile within my sleep. 

Oft in my light-keeled boat, 
Your tremulous wave afloat, 
Your bosom me has borne, 

Your strength my weakness known. 
Till wearying care, and scorn, 

And every fear, were flown ; 
Until, with spell most magical. 
You in my bosom quelled 
All phantoms tragical, 
And pain and doubt dispelled. 
As when a cloud upon your breast removes. 
And down the sun shines on the wave it loves. 

Full many a placid hour 

Beside your edge I 've strayed, 
And many a sylvan bower 
Has Fancy there displayed. 
Below your historic Battle-Bridge you wander through 

a plain, 
There 'mid your wide lone meadow-lands to turn and 
turn again ; 




" Full many a placid hour 

Beside your edge I 've strayed, 
And many a sylvan bower 
Has Fancy there displayed." 

— Fdciiig pdge 2g2 



EARLIER PIECES 293 

But in your narrower, shadier course, where trees 

your waves o'erhang 
And dewy verdure thickly lies as where the Sirens 
sang, — 
Here many a grateful leafy dell 

My feet of yore have found, 
Nor deemed you had a parallel 
The wide earth round. 

Full oft beside your vernal banks. 
What time might come Spring's jocund charioteer. 

Have I been mute observer of the thanks 
With which you knew earth's natal glories near — 
Rippling in gratitude when you should learn 
Had come the blushing violet and fern. 
Plashing your emerald edge 

With joyous dew. 
You kissed with welcoming pledge 
Earth's offerings new. 

And I have seen your greeting to the stars. 
As one by one they flecked your tranquil floor — 
Venus, and red-browed Mars, 

And countless myriads more, 
Gleaming amid the eternal height, 
The golden diadem of Night. 
And when unto her full might grow 

The round red harvest moon, 
The one above and one below 

Made midnight mimic noon : 



294 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

For mirrored wondrously upon your tide, 

Limned by a brush unseen your bosom o'er, 
Stood every spark amid heaven's arches wide, 
And every moonlit marvel of the shore : 
Each tree and twig, each fluttering leaf, was there. 

As truly represented as in air : 
And scarce the line the wave and land between, 
So perfect was the juncture, could by eye be seen. 

Amid the verdant foliage at your side. 

Unknown to all the world but you and me, 
A countless classic host have lived and died. 
And linger now not e'en in memory. 
My books indeed have taught 
Of many a fruitful land and holy age ; 

Yet to my soul with wisdom full as fraught 
Has been your springtime foliage ! 
For I have looked through you as through a portal. 
And dreamed I met the gaze of the Immortal ! 



EARLIER PIECES 295 



WHITHER, YE STATELY SHIPS 

Whither, ye stately ships, 

In grandeur do ye ride ? 
Oh, do ye never tremble, dreading dire eclipse, 

As silently ye glide 
Athwart the Ocean's lips ? 

Far o'er the widening seas 
Ye sail to beauteous lands : 
Alike 'mid Behring's ice and Sunda's odorous ease 
Obedient to the hands 

Which bend you to the breeze. 

Proudly your course ye take 
Where ne'er before went keel. 
Or follow in the track where thirsty myriads slake 
The intense desire they feel 
For far-off loved-ones' sake. 

Gibraltar's frowning rocks 
May shadow you in gloom ; 
But when ye have outridden the vengeful Equinox, 
Ye find deep harbor-room 
Where ne'er come tempest-shocks. 

Outward indeed ye fly, 

And farthest oceans trace ; 



296 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

But if ye once shall gain the sought Sicilian sky, 
Homeward ye then may race 
In gladdest ecstasy. 

Never a cargo bear 

Of shame or crime, O ships ! 
Better that whirlwind rend, or treacherous waves 
insnare. 
Than that Contagion's lips 
Should taint your heaven-free air. 

But far as oceans stretch, 

Or Austral islands rise. 
Wing ye love's message to the wild despairing wretch 

Who, fainting, seeks the prize 
Unfound unless ye fetch. 

Scorched amid Central Zone, 

Crushed by Antarctic ice, ' 

Ever, O stately ships, your nobler birthright own, 

Nor plunge, a sacrifice. 
With but a gurgling groan ! 

Back ! bring our sons safe back ! 
Our brothers, lovers, friends ! 
We had not let them sail with you your venturous 
track, 
But that our faith extends 
Beyond a drifting wrack ! 



EARLIER PIECES 297 

Our faith in you, O ships, 
Uphold and justify ! 
And firm as boatman builds, and staunch as he 
equips, 
Sail ye an Argosy 
That meets nor dreads eclipse ! 



THE SORROWING WIND 

I sat awaiting one who did not come. 
Against my window the November rain 
Pattered a weird and pitiful refrain : 
Never dear Mother Nature's voice is dumb. 
Drearily, as in penitence, the wind 
Murmured a Miserere — had it sinned ? 
Had it been boisterous upon the deep ? 
Had it been cruel — tossing ships about. 
And sending sailors to their watery sleep ? 
With aimless fury and disastrous rout 
Had it been leveling dim forest aisles, 
And devastating fields for miles and miles ? 



298 ADDITIONAL POEMS 



A CANE FROM GETHSEMANE 

A simple cane is here — a pilgrim staff : 

Yet on its polished face, 
In quaintly graven Hebrew paragraph, 

A sacred name I trace. 

" Gethsemane : Mount Olivet." The phrase 

Bespeaks the favored earth 
Where, ages since, — in unremembered days, — 

Its sacred tree had birth. 

A traveler brought it — fragrant with the air 

Of that clear Syrian sky. 
"Here, friend," he said, "the staff is yours; you care 

For such things more than I." 

I hold it in my hand, as here I sit, 

And musing close my eye ; 
And far and fast doth subtle Fancy flit. 

Imagination fly. 

In shorn Gethsemane, to this far day, 

Is shown the grotto wild 
Where Abraham prepared the wood to slay 

Isaac his first-born child. 

Here David, harp in hand, from yonder hills 

His native Bethlehem nigh. 
Oft wandered with his sheep, the rippling rills 

And quiet waters by, 



EARLIER PIECES 299 

And rested, sweeping with his hand the strings 

Melodious with praise, 
Laying his head upon these rootlets' rings, 

Lit by the sun's last rays. 

Here Solomon had come, with timbrels, flutes, 

And cymbals clashing loud ; 
With solemn sackbuts, fifes, and silvery lutes, 

In royal garments proud ; 

With damsels rich in dyes from Tyrian shore ; 

Playing at games of chance ; 
Laughing to see upon the leafy floor 

The Jewish maidens dance. 

Here Philip's son, great Alexander, came. 

His hands with slaughter wet. 
And bowed himself before the jeweled flame 

Of priestly coronet. 

The god of Macedon was Mars the Red, 

His empire on increase : 
The God of Shiloh's olives overhead 

Here gently whispered, " Peace ! " 

Here Jesus, Joseph's son, a mightier king, 

Weighed down with woes of men. 
Came praying he perchance their lives might bring 

To God and Heaven again. 

Here too, while his disciples slept, he sweat 
As it were drops of blood — 



300 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

His brow, in agony, already wet 
With Friday's crimson flood. 

And here the Angel came, in raiment white. 

To strengthen him and bless. 
Making a Bethel of the darksome night. 

And joy of his distress. 

Here Judas, jeering, brought the priestly crowd 

With lanterns, swords, and staves — 
His thirty silver pieces jingling loud 

And murmuring ** Paupers' graves ! " 

Here Titus came, and with his army vast 

Uprooted every tree. 
Thy glory then, Jerusalem, was past ! 

And thine, Gethsemane ! 

But ere that fatal hour, the cane I hold 

Was plucked from off its tree, 
And down through monkish cloisters dim and old 

At last has come to me. 

This very bough, perhaps, its portion gave 

For Abraham's altar fire, 
When sadly building — deeming naught could save — 

His first-born's funeral-pyre. 

This very bough — who knows ? — the bough may be 

That sheltered David's lambs ; 
Beneath which Solomon, the Wise, in glee 

Made proverb-epigrams ; 



EARLIER PIECES 301 

That Alexander bowed beneath ; that he 
Of Nazareth sought for prayer ; 

That worn disciples brushed ; that treachery- 
Sought out and made a snare. . . . 

O sacred bough ! from thy long history 

Some lesson I would learn ! 
Would that from thee some heavenly mystery 

Within my soul might burn ! 



THE VIOLET 

I met within the wilding wood 

A violet nodding in a dell : 
Its bud was blue, its stalk was green ; 

And now when I would tell 
The story of that simple flower 

There rises to my view 
A perfect picture of the scene — 
The nodding violet's stalk of green, 

Its flower of lovely blue. 
In all the world was never seen 
A bluer blue, a greener green. 

I met within the city street 
A darling little blue-eyed girl : 

Her eye was bright, her step was light, 
And on her brow a curl 

Of fairest, purest gold hung free. 



302 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

With smiles she looked at me ! 
Her heart, dear child ! was light as air, 
As free as air from sorrow. There 

Could never, surely, be 
A step more light, an eye more blue, 
A soul more innocent or true. 

A few short days — alas ! alas ! 

I met her in the street no more. 
I know not how it came to pass. 

But knocking at my door 
One evening as I writing sat. 

Approached a little boy — 
Her brother — who beside my knee 
Bewailed and wept so piteously 

That it would needs employ 
A power beyond my tenderest art 
To hush the turbulence of his heart. 

I clasped him in my close embrace : 

His burning cheeks with tears were wet. 
To mine he raised his mournful face — 

Ah ! ne'er shall I forget 
The hope, the doubt, the keen despair 

That mantled in his eye. 
I still can hear him importune : 
" Oh, — say she will be better soon ! 

Tell me she will not die ! " 
My heart could not deny the boon : 
" Ah, yes ! " I said — " be better soon." 



EARLIER PIECES 303 

I hastened to the wilding wood, 

And sought the violet in the dell, 
Whose bud was blue, whose stalk was green. 

I surely need not tell 
Upon whose breast, within whose hand, 

The flower was shortly seen. 
She on it petals looked, and smiled ; 
Upon the bud of blue, poor child ! 

And on the stalk of green. 
And then she closed her bright blue eyes, 
And flew afar to Paradise. 

Upon her breast, within her hand, 

The violet still was seen — 
The violet with its bud of blue. 

Its stalk of brilliant green — 
When robed for Fairyland she lay. 

I doubt not when in love 
The angels met her, and her eyes 
Beheld the blooms of Paradise, 

Were none more fair above ! 
Nor there in heaven might angels view 
A soul than hers more pure and true. 



304 ADDITIONAL POEMS 

ALL AS ONE 

[ Early fragment ] 

Not greatly distant from the sounding sea 
Beside whose edge I frequent wend my way, 
An ancient forest, deep and silent, lies — 
Reputed home of nymph and woodland fay. 
Verdant primeval arches rise o'erhead, 
And hide the earth from sunlight and the sky ; 
And drooping mosses hang from every limb — 
Gauze curtains swaying in the east wind's sigh. 

The hemlock and the pine are brothers here ; 
Their branches they in mutual friendship wield, 
And when the winter blasts and snows appear. 
Each strives the other from the storms to shield. 
Oh, would that men might here a lesson learn. 
And all as one their strength and faith compare. 
That when were nigh the fitful storms of life 
The strong the burdens of the weak might bear. 



L' ENVOI: METEORS 

I sit in the gloom 

Of my evening room 

On the hilltop high, and gaze on the tomb 

Of darkness which covers earth's beauty and bloom. 

O'er the river's gray track 

Rise the hillslopes black — 

Like peddlers, each holding a house for a pack, 

Or like Atlas of old, with the town on their back. 

In the northern sky, 

From their throne on high, 

Fair meteors flash on the wondering eye, 

And fall into darkness, and fail, and die : 

Fall suddenly down. 

With the gleam of a crown, 

To fade in the mists and the shadows brown 

Which hazily hang over meadow and town. 

The villagers sleep : 
Over valley and steep 

Not a household light breaks the darkness deep : 
The pale stars only their vigils keep. 

30s 



3o6 L' ENVOI: METEORS 

But look ! through the night 

(Where a meteor bright 

Just vanishing seemed to fall in its flight) 

There shines in a window a welcoming light ! — 

A scintillant glare, 

Rich, luminous, rare, — 

As if when the meteor vanished in air 

It charmed a new star into radiance there ! 

^— O soul of mine ! 

When the Angel Divine 

Shall summon thee swift to a region benign, — 

Shall summon thee swift, and thou follow his sign, 

Thou wouldst not ask more 

Than some heart on life's shore 

Grow bright with a gleam of thy vanishing lore — 

Grow bright with a lustre undreamed of before. 



INDEX OF TITLES 



Accelerant, 37 

Across the Line: At Fifty, 146 

Admiration of World-Helpers, 
In, 56 

After a Week with a Wood- 
chopper, 125 

Age of Good, The, 75 

All as One, 304 

Alpha and Omega, 39 

And Last of All I Learn It, 137 

Angel, The Loveliest, 148 

At Spruce-Tree, 279 

At the Summit, 127 

At the Turn of the Road, 203 

Baby of the Twentieth Century, 

To a, 38 
Beacon-Lights, 87 
Beauty, Ideal, 133 
Beauty, Life's, 105 
Bells of Como, The, 207 
Birch, The Silver, 189 
Birches, Vine and, 187 
Birthday, For a, 261 
Blake, James Vila, To, 277. (See 

also, " Seventy," 274) 
Blue Hills in November, In the, 

I., II., 182-183 
Blue Hills Reservation, 

Sonnets of the, 181-192 
Body and Spirit, 155 
Bon Voyage, 264 
" Breath from the Fields, A," 150 
Bridgman, Raymond L. ( " The 

Loyal Traitor"), 282 
Burial-G round, In a Country, 256 
By Dark or Light, 168 
By the Dark-Bright River, 204 

Cane from Gethsemane, A, 298 
Cape Ann, On, 175 
Causation, 144 

Charles, On Crossing the, at Its 
Mouth, 172 



Chickatawbut, To a Hemlock on, 

191 
Children, To My, on Their 

Marriage Day, 268 
Children's Children, 57 
Christmas, Merry, 262 
Christmas ("Then Felt I Like 

Some Watcher of the Skies," 

262) 
Clown, Sage and, 114 
Coin in Any Realm, 102 
College Hill, 254 
College Hill, Moonlight on, 251 

(See also, Tufts College) 
Como, The Bells of, 207 
Comrades, 171 
Concord River, 291 
Confessions of a Voluptuary, 107 
Courage, O Workers 1 49 
Creators, The New, 54 
Crosby, Ernest, Meditation After 

the Passing of, 60 
Cross, Star and, 76 
Crosses, Self-Made, 143 
Cypress-Crowned, 119 

Daffodils, 152 

Dark-Bright River, By the, 204 

Dayspring, The, 53 

Day Unto Day, 235 

Dead Student, The, 285 

Dear Mother Earth, 176 

Death of My Friend : The Old 
Year, 265 

Death, The Kiss of, 194 

(See also. Poems of the Im- 
mortal Hope, 193-206) 

December Hilltops, 192 

Deeds, Words and, 116 

Deeper and Higher, 71 

Detritus, I.-IV., 58-60 

Devil of Drink, The, 116 

Dragon-Fly, Sonata of the, 153 

Dream, The Schoolmaster's, 242 



307 



3o8 



INDEX OF TITLES 



Dream-Counsel, 117 
Dream-Prophecy, 55 
Drink, The Devil of, 116 

Earlier Pieces, 291-304 

Earth at Play, The, 170 

Earth, Dear Mother, 176 

Earth's Golden Prime Lies In- 
finitely On, 65 

Easter, 266 

Eastward Windows, 204 

Eddowes, Harold (" In Quest to 
Know "), 278 

Enchanted Ground, 168 

Entombed, 63 

Epic of Man, The, 27 

Evangel, The New, 77 

Exemplar, 174 

" Fields, A Breath from the," 150 

Finished, 284 

Five Times, 283 

Foils, I., II., 138-139 

For a Birthday, 261 

Forelooking, 120 

Forever On, 103 

Free Religion ( " The Liberty 

Wherewith We are Made 

Free "), 74 
Future Life (see Poems of the 

Immortal Hope, 193-206) 
Futures, 102 

Gain Still the Goal, 186 
Gethsemane, A Cane from, 298 
God and Man, 72 
God, In the name of, 76 
God, My, — To Truth, 69 
God's Mariners, I, II., 280-281 
God's True Word, Man's Best 

Word, T2) 
Good, Loftier, 84 
Good Shall Conquer, Never 

Fear, 51 
Good, The Age of, 75 
" Good-Bye," 259 
Gone, 201 
Great, The, 43 
Gull and Wave, 174 



Hancock Hill, On, 183 
Hardness, To Prize Life's, 129 
Heart of Youth, 227 
Heart's Treasures, 136 
Hemlock, A Spray of, 173 
Hemlock on Chickatawbut, 

To a, 191 
Heredity, 144 
Hills of Morning, 170 
Hilltops, December, 192 
Holmes, Oliver Wendell (" The 

Laughing Philosopher"), no 
Hours of Insight, 132 
How Sing'st Thou, Then? 130 
Human Progress, Poems of, 

3-64 
Humanity, The Wail of Low, 47 

Ideal Beauty, 133 

I Feel that I Know Her, 238 

Immortal Hope, Poems^of 

THE, 193-206 I "^'^ 

In a Country Burial-Ground, 256 
In Admiration of World-Helpers, 

56 
In Grateful Love, 267 
In Quest to Know, 278 
In Secret, 80 
In Suburban Woods, 166 
In the Blue Hills in November, 

L, II., 182-183 
In the Name of God, 76 
"In Thy Youth," 104 
In Treetop Land, 149 
In Vacation, 167 
In Wildcat Notch, 184 
In Wonder Every Hour, 184 
Indian Summer, 181 
Insight, Hours of, 132 
Inward Fires, 113 
" I Will Lay Mine Hand Upon 

My Mouth," 89 

Janes, Lewis G., 288 
Joy in One's Work, 130 
Justice ! Freedom ! 48 

Kiss of Death, The, 194 
Known of Old, 205 



INDEX OF TITLES 



309 



" Laborers Together," 82 
Last of all I Learn It, And, 137 
Laughing Philosopher, The, no 
L'Envoi : Meteors, 305 
Liberty Wherewith We Are 

Made Free, The, 74 
Life, Religion as a, 88 
Life's Beauty, 105 
Life's Hardness, To Prize, 129 
Life's Meaning, 98 
Living, Poems of, 93-148 
Loftier Good, 84 
" Look Back at Times," 269 
Love, When Young Hearts, 237 
Love's Predicament, 257 
Loved and Gone, The, 195 
Loveliest Angel, The, 148 
Lowell, James Russell, 56 
Loyal Traitor, The, 282 

Man, God and, 72 

Man, The Epic of, 27 

Man on the Mountain, The, 131 

Man's Best Word God's True 

Word, 73 
Man's Opportunity, 93 
Man's Triumph-Era, 3 
Marriage Day, To My Children 

on Their, 268 
Meditation After the Passing of 

Ernest Crosby, 60 
Merry Christmas, 262 
Meteors (L'Envoi), 305 
Midas and Musagetes, 249 
Moonlight on College Hill, 251 
Mother, The, 86 
Mother and Child, 276 
Mother Earth, Dear, 176 
Muse, To the. After Silence, 258 
My Feathered Preacher, 132 
Mystic River, 157 

Nameless Record, The, 141 

Nature, Poems of, 149-192 

Nature's Foundlings, 177 

New Creators, The, 54 

New Evangel, The, 77 

No More, 46 

Noon in the Printing-Shop, 140 



" Of One," 86 

Old-Time Boys, The, 15 

Old Timothy John, 245 

Old Year, Death of My PMend : 

The, 265 
On Board Ship in Sassamon 

Notch, 186 
On Cape Ann, 175 
On Crossing the Charles at Its 

Mouth, 172 
On Hancock Hill, 183 
One with All, 165 
Oneness, Recognition of, 90 
Opportunity, Man's, 93 
O Story-Teller! Poet! 61 
Out of the Distance, 271 

Pan, 163 

Paradise, Soul's, 103 

Passing, The, 199 

Path, The, I., II., 134-135 

Path of Sun, The, 97 

Patterson, A. J., 290 

Penalty, 258 

Pendulum, The, 180 

Philippines, The 
Five Times, 283 
Loyal Traitor, The, 282 
Redeem Yourself, O Land, 282 

Pine-Tree, The, 190 

Platitudes, 139 

Poems of Human Progress, 

3-64 
Poems of Living, 93-148 
Poems of Nature, 149-192 
Poems of Religious Progress, 

65-92 
Poems of the Immortal Hope, 

193-206 
" Prepared," 70 

Printing-Shop, Noon in the, 140 
Proem ("Revolve, O Earth"), i 
Prophecy, Dream-, 55 

Quatrains, Three, 116 

Radiant Youth I Knew, A, I., II., 

142-143 
Rebirth, 260 



3IO 



INDEX OF TITLES 



Reciprocation, 54 
Recognition of Oneness, 90 
Redeem Yourself, O Land, 282 
Religion as a Life, 88 
Religion, Free (" The Liberty 

Wherewith We are Made 

Free"), 74 
Religious Progress, Poems 

OF, 65-92 
Residuum, I., IL, 62-63 
Revelation, 85 

Revolve, O Earth (Proem), i 
Robbins, Wentworth Brooks 

("The Dead Student"), 285 

Sage and Clown, 114 
Sassamon Notch, On Board Ship 

in, 186 
Schoolmaster's Dream, The, 242 
Search, 83 
Secret, The, 178 
Self, To Thine Own, Be True, 92 
Self-Gratulation, 145 
Self-Illumined, 116 
Self-Made Crosses, 143 
Sense, Soul and, 104 
" Seventy," 274 
" Shanty, The," 188 
Ships, Whither, Ye Stately, 295 
" Signs and Wonders," 66 
Silver Birch, The, 189 
Simmons, H. M. ("The Victor"), 

So Like the Spring She Stands, 

169 
Sonata of the Dragon- Fly, 153 
Song, The Spirit of, 2 
Songs, Sweetest, are Never Sung, 

240 
Sorrowing Wind, The, 297 
Soul and Sense, 104 
Soul's Paradise, 103 
Spirals, 136 
Spirit, Body and, 155 
Spirit of Song, The, 2 
Spirit with Spirit, 179 
Spray of Hemlock, A, 173 
Spruce-Tree, At, 279 
Star and Cross, 76 



Straw, Two Wisps of, 176 
Student, The Dead, 285 
Suburban Woods, In, 166 
Summit, At the, 127 
Sunrise in Codman Park, 166 
Sunset Sea, Through the, 123 
Sunshine, 160 

Sweetest Songs are Never Sung, 
240 

Temple, Edward F. (" Known of 

Old "), 205 
" Then Felt I Like Some Watcher 

of the Skies," 262 
Three Quatrains, 116 

Devil of Drink, The 

Self-Illumined 

Words and Deeds 
Through the Sunset Sea, 123 
Thyself Within, 96 
Timothy John, Old, 245 
To a Baby of the Twentieth 

Century, 38 
To a Hemlock on Chickatawbut, 

191 
To James Vila Blake, 277 
To My Children on Their 

Marriage Day, 26S 
To My Old Wheel, 172 
To Prize Life's Hardness, 129 
To the Muse, After Silence, 258 
" To Thine Own Self Be True," 

92 
To Truth — My God, 69 
To Yield, 64 
Traitor, The Loyal, 282 
Transcendent Possibility, The, 

193 
Transformation, 79 
Treasures, Heart's, 136 
Treetop Land, In, 149 
True Life of Us, 140 
Truth, To, — My God, 69 
Tufts College, Poems describing, 
delivered at, or having 
relation to : 

Bells of Como, The, 207 

College Hill, 254 

Dead Student, The, 285 



INDEX OF TITLES 



311 



Tufts College (^continued') 
Forelooking, 120 
Heart of Youth, I., 227 
Known of Old, 205 note 
Man's Triumph-Era, 3 
Moonlight on College Hill, 251 
Mystic River, 159 note 
Old-Time Boys, The, 15 
Through the Sunset Sea, 123 

Turn of the Road, At the, 203 

Twentieth Century, To a Baby of 
the, 38 

Two Wisps of Straw, 176 

Ultima Thule, 147 

Ungrasped, 95 

Up Higher, 272 

Up to the Heights, 41 

Uplifts of Heart and Will, 78 

Vacation, In, 167 

Vanished, The, 206 

Victor, The, 135 

Vine and Birches, 187 

Violet, The, 301 

Voluptuary, Confessions of a, 107 

Wail of Low Humanity, The, 47 
War (" No More "), 46. (See 
also General Index) 



What Are We Here For? 42 
Wheel, To My Old, 172 
When Young Hearts Love, 

237 
Whence the Glory ? 80 
Whither, Ye Stately Ships, 295 
Who Knows ? 196 
Wildcat Notch, In, 184 
Wind, The Sorrowing, 297 
Wings, 91 
Winter Glory, 185 
Wonder Every Hour, In, 184 
Woodchopper, After a Week 

with a, 125 
Woods, In Suburban, 166 
Words and Deeds, 116 
Work, 106 

Work, Joy in One's, 130 
Workers, Courage, O, 49 
World- Helpers, In Admiration 

of, 56 
Worship, 84 

Yield, To, 64 

Youth, Heart of, 227 

Youth I Knew, A Radiant, 

I., II., 142-143 
"Youth, In Thy," 104 

Zeal, 122 



INDEX OF SONNETS 



Across the Line: At Fifty, 146 
And Last of All I Learn It, 

137 
At Spruce-Tree, 279 
At the Turn of the Road, 203 

Beacon-Lights, 87 

By Dark or Light, 168 

By the Dark-Bright River, 204 

Causation, 144 
Children's Children, 57 
Comrades, 171 

Dayspring, The, 53 
Dear Mother Earth, 176 
December Hilltops, 192 
Detritus, I., 58 
IL, 58 

IIL, 59 

IV., 59 
Dream-Prophecy, 55 

Earth at Play, The, 170 
Eastward Windows, 204 
Enchanted Ground, 168 
Entombed, 63 
Exemplar, 174 

Finished, 284 
Five Times, 283 
Foils, I., 138 
II., 138 

Gain Still the Goal, 186 
God's Mariners, I., 280 

II., 280 
" Good-Bye," 259 
Gull and Wave, 1 74 

Heart's Treasures, 136 

Heredity, 144 

Hills of Morning, 170 



Hours of Insight, 132 

How Sing'st Thou, Then ? 130 

Ideal Beauty, 133 

In a Country Burial - Ground, 

256 
In Admiration of World-Helpers, 

56 
In Quest to Know, 278 
In Suburban Woods, 166 
In the Blue Hills in November, 
I., 182 

II., 182 
In Vacation, 167 
In Wildcat Notch, 184 
In Wonder Every Hour, 184 
Indian Summer, 181 
" I Will Lay Mine Hand Upon 

My Mouth," 89 

Joy in One's Work, 130 

Known of Old, 205 

Loftier Good, 84 
Loveliest Angel, The, 148 
Love's Predicament, 257 
Lowell, James Russell, 56 
Loyal Traitor, The, 282 

Man on the Mountain, The, 

131 
Meditation After the Passing of 

Ernest Crosby, 60 
Mother, The, 86 
Mother and Child, 276 
My Feathered Preacher, 132 

Nameless Record, The, 141 
Nature's Foundlings, 177 
New Creators, The, 54 
Noon in the Printing - Shop, 
140 



312 



INDEX OF SONNETS 



313 



" Of One," 86 

On Board Ship in Sassamon 

Notch, 1S6 
On Cape Ann, 175 
On Crossing the Charles at Its 

Mouth, 172 
On Hancock Hill, 183 
One with All, 165 
O Story-Teller ! Poet ! 61 

Path, The, I., 134 

II., 134 
Penalty, 258 
Pendulum, The, 180 
Pine-Tree, The, 190 
Platitudes, 139 

Radiant Youth I Knew, A, 
I., 142 

II., 142 
Rebirth, 260 
Reciprocation, 54 
Recognition of Oneness, 90 
Redeem Yourself, O Land, 282 
Religion as a Life, 88 
Residuum, I., 62 

II., 62 
Revelation, 85 

Search, 83 
Secret, The, 178 
Self-Gratulation, 145 



Self-Made Crosses, 143 

" Shanty, The, " 188 

Silver Birch, The, 189 

So Like the Spring She Stands, 

169 
Spirals, 136 
Spirit with Spirit, 179 
Spray of Hemlock, A, 173 
Sunrise in Codman Park, 166 

To a Hemlock on Chickatawbut, 

191 
To James Vila Blake, 277 
To My Old Wheel, 172 
To Prize Life's Hardness, 129 
To the Muse, After Silence, 

258 
" To Thine Own Self be True," 

92 
To Yield, 64 
True Life of Us, 140 
Two Wisps of Straw, 176 

Ultima Thule, 147 

Vanished, The, 206 
Victor, The, 135 
Vine and Birches, 187 

Wings, 91 
Winter Glory, 185 
Worship, 84 



GENERAL INDEX 

References to birds, flowers, trees, stars, mountains, rivers, 
and to a few other topics, are grouped ] 



Abraham, 298, 300 

Academe, 16, 19, 288 

Achilles, 116 

Act vs. good intention, 116 

Adam and Eve, 91 

Adventure, 91,92, 121, 235, 280- 

281 (see discovery) 
^schylus, 5 
.(^sop, 160 
Affection, 4, 16, 169, 274, 277 (see 

love, friendship, brotherhood, 

good will to men) 
Age, golden (see golden age) 
Age of good (see good on earth) 
Age, old (see old age) 
Agriculture, i, 23, 30, 58, 99, 125 

130, 176 
Alexander the great, 43, 64, 299 
Alma Mater, 17 
Alps, 4, 25, 44, 218, 254 
Ambition, 6, 16, 18, 78, 86, 273 
America, i, 6, 24, 27, 282 
Anarchist, the, 20 
Anarchy (see individualism) 
Angels, 12, 76, 76-77, 91, 106, 115 

144, 148, 198, 208 ft, 222, 237 

243' 300, 303, 306 
Angelus, 214 
Animals — chipmunk, 125, 152 

dog, 1 1 1 

flocks and herds, 108 

fox, 181, 185 

lion, 135 

lizard, 40 

rabbit, hare, 33, 142, 185, 228 

serpent, 135 

sheep, 108, 298, 300 

squirrel, 125, 152, 173, 184, 228 

tiger, 20 

wildcat, 184 

wolf, 184 



Antarctic, 197, 296 

Anthropos, 20, 25 

Anti-imperialism, 24, 282-3, 289 

Apocalypse, 252 

Apollo (Phoebus), 168, 234 

Apollo's pipe, 8 

Appreciation, 242-244, 277 (see 

praise and blame) 
April, 174, 177, 287 
Arabia, 154 
Arbela, 64 
A ready, 211 

Arctic, I, 4, 49, 186, 217 
Ariadne's clue, 7 
Arimathea, Joseph of, 77 
Arlington Heights, 123, 228 
Art, I, 21, 38, 45, 63, 109, 113 

130, 176, 208 (see sculpture) 
Aryans, 30 
Asia, 43, 64, 136 
Asphodel, 148 (see flowers) 
Aspiration, 8, 20, 23, 26, 34, 40 

41, 80, 84, 90, 112, 131, 132 

133, 146, 209, 225, 229, 276, 281 

284 (see moral ideal ; beauty) 
Assizi, Francis of, 45 
Aster, 80, 154, 156, 183, 245 
Astrology, 13 
Athens, 220 

Atlantic ocean, 153, 172 
Atlas, 305 
Attica, 7, 163 
August, 181 
Aurelius, Marcus, 45 
Austral islands, 296 
Autumn, 10, 68, 123, 180 
Avarice, 20, 57, 88, 146, 149, 249- 

250, 281 (see greed, selfishness, 

wealth, money) 
Avocation and vocation, 5 
Azrael, 148, 306 



314 



GENERAL INDEX 



315 



Babylon, 9, 168 

Baffin's bay, 186 

Balkan massacres, 57 

Ballou, Hosea, 228 

Bank, a sure, 127 

Beach, 49-50, 87, 93, 124, 153- 

155' 158, 172, 174. i75'i84{see 

harbors, lighthouses, sea, ships, 

shore, sailors, waves, ocean) 
Bear Indian tribe, 58 
Beauty, ideal, 105, 133, 289 

of life (see life ; moral ideal) 

of Nature (see Nature) 
Bedford gaol, 188 
Bee, 19, 144, 152, 165, 183 
Beggar's bowl, 167, 178 
Behring's straits, 295 
Belgium and Congo, 24 
Bermudas, 49 
Bethel, 300 

Bethlehem, 172, 219, 298 
Beulah, 161, 173 
Bible, ID, 67, 74, 85, 123, 124 
(see revelation) 

of Nature, 67, 85, 288 (see 
Nature) 
Bibles, origin of, 83, 85 
Bicycling, 107, 172 
Birch-tree (see trees) 
Birds (unspecified), 12, 35, 49, 86 
94-95' "5' 129, 132, 140 
146, 160, 163-164, 166, 183 
192, 199, 259, 266 

bluebird, 177 

bluejay, 167 

bobolink, 107, 151, 158, 160 
172, 229, 230, 266 

bobwhite (quail), 171 

chickadee, 182, 185 

crow, 229, 272 

dove, 232, 234 

flicker, 169 

gull, 119, 121, 158, 173, 174 

hawk, 154, 186 

mockingbird, 237 

meadow (song) sparrow, 2, 178 

oriole, 49, 154 

ovenbird, 184 

partridge, 185, 228 



Birds {continued) 

robin, 2, 19, 107, 149, 151, 160 

163, 167, 169, 254, 256 
snowbird, 185 
swallow, 119, 167 
thrush, 55, 158 
veery, 184 

vulture, 7, 44,' 142, 230 
whip-poor-will, 19, 252 
wild geese, 192 
yellowbird, 154 
Bird-songs, 2, 12, 19, 49, 55, 94- 
95, 115, 129, 132, 140, 146, 149 
151, 158, 160, 163-164, 167, 171 
172, 177, 178, 184, 185, 199, 229 
230,237,252,259,266 
Birthdays, 261, 274, 277, 280 
Blake, James Vila, 274, 277 
Blue Hills, Mass., 167, 181-192 

228 
"Bob White," 171 
Boccaccio, 207 
Bodhi-tree, 167 
Body and spirit, 79, 155-157 

(see soul) 
Bon voyage, 264 
Books, 9, 15, 108, 124, 161, 172 

270, 294 
Boreal, 49, 168 
Boston Common, 1 1 1 
Boston harbor, i66, 184, 252 
Boyhood, 136, 154, 172-173, 174 

175, 209, 247, 267 
Brahm, 28 
Brazil, 158, 256 
Breeze, 19, 49, 115, 125, 155, 178 

185, 217, 231, 235 (see wind) 
Bridgman, Raymond L., 282 
British grenadier, 253 
Brooks, 9, 94, 154, 163, 165, 173 
178, 183, 185, 187, 266; Ale- 
wife brook, 228 (see rivers, 
streams) 
Brotherhood, 4, 7, 8, 20, 21, 22, 23 
24, 26, 32-34, 39, 46, 47-48, 50 
54. 55- 56-57. 58.61,65,70-71 
75, 78, 84, 87, 88, 89, loi, 102 
109,128, 175,243-244,262,304 
(see good will, friendship) 



3i6 



GENERAL INDEX 



Bryant, 125 

Buddha, Siddartha, 45, 86, 167 

Buddhism. 219 

Bull, Ole, Studio House, 288 

Bunker Hill, 227 

Bunyan, 161, 188 

Burial-ground, country, 256 

Buried alive, 63 

Burns, Robert, 45 

Caesar, Julius, 16, 44, 141 

Caesars, the, 63, 207 

Calculus, 4, 24 

Calypso, 225 

Canaan, 124 

Cape Ann, 175 

Casca's dagger-rent, 44 

Castles in air, 239 

Cathay, 219 (see China) 

Caucasus, 7, 142, 229 

Causation, 29, 30, 31-34, 102 
144 

" Cause and effect," 246 

Change and loss, 96, 97, 130 

Chaos, 21, 55, 59, 81, 98, 107 
260 

Charles river, 172, 228 

Cheerfulness, 97, 132, 189 (see 
contentment, serenity, mirth) 

Chickatawbut, 181, 185, 191 

Children, 9, 22, 23, ;i^, 37, 38, 42 
461 55) 57) 62, 68, 88, 109, 112 
114-115,131,136-137, 146,164 
169, 170, 204, 208, 235, 242- 
244, 247, 250, 258, 269, 276 

278, 301-303 
Children of Mother Nature, 22 

87 (see Nature) 
China, 9, 62, 219 
Christian science (see mental) 
Christianity, 87 
" Christless," 70 (see Jesus) 
Christmas, 262, 262-263, ^75 
Church, II, 35, 74, 76, 137, 223- 

224 
Church councils, 76, 137 
Circe, 190, 225 
Circumstance, 23^ 129, 130, 157 

(see fate) 



City vs. country, 125-126, 140 
150, 156, 161, 166, 174, 177 
182, 191, 228, 254, 272-273 

Cliffs, crags, 178, 179, 184-185 
23I' 235, 239 

Clouds, 19, 115, 162, 173, 178 
184, 220, 228, 292 (see sky) 

College class-room vs. individu- 
ality, 15 (see individuality) 

College friendships 4. 15-17, 222 
228-230, 255-256, 286 

College Hill (Tufts College), 4 
14, 17, 120, 123, 158-159, 227- 
228, 251-253, 254-256 

Columbus, 14 

Comets, 196 

Como, 207 ff 

Commandment, New, 65 

Concord battle-bridge, 292 

Concord river, 291-294 

Conflict, life's, 121-122, 136, 185 
(see life, hardness, serenity) 

Confucius, 86 

Congo, Belgian atrocities in, 24 

Conquest, 6, 40, 43-44, 47, 57, 61 
147 (see war) 

Conscience, 74, 81, 82, 84 (see 
moral ideal) 

Consequences (see causation) 

Contentment, 45, 109, 120, 139 
(see cheerfulness, serenity) 

Convention, social, 145, 282 

Conway, Moncure D., 27 

Co-operation, 20, ^^ (see brother- 
hood) 

Cornfields, 1,99, 155, 171 

Cosmopolitanism, 21, 24, 26, 32 
56-57 (see brotherhood) 

Cosmos, 21, 41, 59 (see order) 

Country vs. city (see city) 

Cragfoot spring, 185 

Creative faculty, 5, 16, 20,40, 54 
106, 137, 196 (see inspiration) 

Creeds, 8, 9, 1 1, 32, 65, 70, 73, 74 
75, 83-85, 224 (see dogmas, 
tradition, revelation) 
origin of, 83, 84, 224 

Cremation, 191 

Criticism, the true, 277 



GENERAL INDEX 



317 



Crosby, Ernest, 60 

Cross, 74, 76-77, 84, 143, 262 

in daily life, 97, 143, 262 
Crow Indian tribe, 58 
Culture, 19, 38 
Curfew-bell, Nature's, 288 
Curtis, George William, 27 
Cyclades, i 
Cyclones, 57 

Dancing, 62, 299 

Dante, 7, 43, 136, 207 

Danube, 62, 218, 256 (see rivers) 

Darius, 64 

Darwin, 10, 45 

Daughters, 169, 194, 268, 269 

David, 298, 300 

Dead sea, 59 

Death, 7, 16, 40, 60, 85, 102, 105 
122, 148, 162, 193-206, 222 
239. 243. 256, 264, 285-287 
2S8-290, 306 (see immortal 
hope) 
preparation for, 70 

December, 180, 187, 192, 265, 284 

Defeat in victory, 104, 143 (see 
victory in defeat) 

Deity, 86 (see God, gods) 

Delight in life (see life) 

Democracy (see brotherhood) 

Despair, 7, 51, 89, 100, 130 

Devils, 28, 29, 35, 57, 116 

Devotion, reverence, 8, 9, 31 

Diet, 88, 108 (see food) 

Disciples of Jesus, 299-300 

Discord, harmony from, 99, 130 
(see life, conflict) 

Discovery, 14, 106, 278, 280-281 
(see adventure) 

Disease, 34, 106 (see health) 

Dogma and interpretation, 1 2 

Dogmas, 8, 1 1, 66-68 (see creeds, 
tradition) 

Doing things, 16 

Dolbear, Amos Emerson, 10 

Domitian, 63 

Doubt, 7, 106, 124, 136 

Douglass, Frederick, 27 

Dragon-fly, 153, 272 



Drama, iii, 178, 274, 277 
Dreams, in sleep, 12, 55, 117 
132, 242, 292 
metaphysical, 9, 10, 11, 12, 32 

63, 76, 89, 14S, 224, 281 
of the ideal good, 12, 18, 19 
20, 37, 41. 50, 62, 70, 129 
131, 132, 174, 2S1, 294 
Dress, 109, 299 
Drink, 43, 88, 114, 116 
Drudgery, 33-34, 47-48, 49- 108 

122, 130 (see work, toil) 
Duty, 13, 31, 56, 78, 81, loi, 102 
105, 118, 128 

Earnestness, 6, 8, 9, 88, 99 (see 

zeal, will) 
Earth (planet), i, 20, 39, 42, 54 

57, 59, 62, 67, 71, 88, 89, 91 

107, 109, 129, 135, 137, 160, 165 

168, 169, 177, 178,187, 266,287 
Earth, Mother (see mother) 
Earth's abundance (see Nature) 
Earth's resources, right of all 

men to, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 38 

42, 50, 55, 88, 109 
Ease, 49, 92, 1 10, 121 (see leisure) 
East (Orient) 11, 121, 173, 176 

184, 219, 255, 289 
East Indies, 289 
Easter, 266 
Eddowes, Harold, 278 
Eden, 91, loi, 159, 173, 176, 214 

276 
Egypt, 9, 62, 63, 96, 124, 136, 250 
Eldorado, 279 

Electricity, 13, 23, 29, 30, 172 
Elysium, 43, 109, 132 
Emerson, 7, 27, 45, 112 (quoted, 

282) 
Enoch, 74 

Environment, 80, 138-139 
Envy, 149 
Epictetus, 45 

Equal opportunity, 21, 22, 50, 88 
Equinox, 120, 295 
Erin, 221 

Error, 12-13, 24, 31, 148 
Eschatology, 89 



3i8 



GENERAL INDEX 



Eternal life, quality, 34, 74, 85 
90, 96, 103, 104, 105, 132 
273, 288 (see soul, spirit) 
quantity (see otherworldliness) 
Eternity, 85, 136, 168, 196, 200 
Eugenics, 37 (see heredity) 
Europe's old dynastic slaughter- 
house, 289 
Euxine, 121 

Evil, 5, 7, II, 13, 21, 29, 48 
51, 71, 83, 84, 130 (see life's 
tragedy) 
Evil impulse (see impulse) 
Evolution, doctrine of, 8, 28, 39- 

40, 129 (see man) 
Example (see influence) 

Faces, i, 4, 15, 168 

Failure, high, 118-119, 147 (see 

victory ; see defeat) 
Fairyland, 270, 303 
Faith, 8, 83, 84, 124, 136, 145 
146 (see trust) 

in good, 97, 137, 183 (see good) 
Fame, 7, 43-46, 102, 229, 261 

(see honors) 
Farming, intensive, 23 (see agri- 
culture) 
Fate, 5, 7, 28, 48, 109, 119, 122 
129, 138, 142, 157, 222 

master of, 138 
Fear, 8, 29, 34, 59, 75, 84, 85, 86 

96, 106, 124, 200 
February, 186 
Fields, 19, 42, 46, 56, 98, 126, 155 

172, 279 (see meadows) 
Filipinos, 24, 282-283, 289 
Firefly, 155 
Flesh-eating, 108 
Floods, 57 

Flowers (unspecified), 4, 9, 13, 16 
22, 25, 55, 70, 72, 93-95, 95 
loi, 103, 132, 143, 144, 146 
150, 160, 165, 166, 183, 184 
235, 266, 271, 278, 284, 287 

asphodel, 148 

aster, 80, 154, 156, 183, 245 

barberry, 229 

blackberry-vines, 182 



Flowers (continued) 

bloodroot, 151, 177 

bluebell, 14 

burning-bush, 14, 126 

buttercup, 18, 170 

cactus, 30 

clematis, 274 

clover, 164, 272 

corn-tassels, i, 155 (99, 171) 

cranesbill, 177, 183 

daffodil, 152 

daisy, 18, 151, 154, 170, 178 

everlasting, 245 

fern, 40, 153, 154, 155, 160, 165 
166, 182, 183, 284, 288, 293 

golden-rod, 154, 183 

gowan, 170 (see daisy) 

grapevine, 12, 58, 187, 239, 264 
276 

grass, ID, 16, 40, 154, 161, 176 
180, 229, 254-255, 272, 279 
timothy and sorrel, 256 

herbs, i, 165 

holly, 275 

hollyhock, 229 

ivy, 144 

laurel, 46, 49, 129 

lichens, 40 

lily, II, 18, 59, 126 

maize, 155 (see corn) 

marguerite, 151, 154 (see daisy) 

marsh-marigold, 177 

moss, 40, 161, 184, 230, 304 

nightshade, 231, 234 

orchard-bloom, 22, 32, 151 

phlox, 229 

pink, 229 

poppy. 55' 80, 165 

primrose (wild), 174 

rhodora, 165 

rose, 29, 30, 55, 59, 85, 88, 95 
126, 131, 142, 156, 185, 229 
238; sweetbrier, 154 

seaweed, 157 

sedge, 153, 160 

simples, i 

smilax, 287 

strawberry-blossom (wild), 174 

sumach, 156, 176, 183, 231 



GENERAL INDEX 



319 



Flowers {contimied) 

violet, 133, 151, 154, 161, 183 
231, 234, 271, 293, 301-303 

water-lily, 234 

windflower, 169 

witch-hazel, 182 
Food for the world, 23 
Forest (see woods, trees) 
Forgiveness, 5, 283 
Fossils, 67, 288 
Francis of Assizi, 45 
Frederick the great, 44 
Free religion, 74, 75, 92, 131 
Free Religious Association, 27 
Freedom, 7, 8, 21, 29, 45, 48, 50 
73, 86, 91, 134, 145, 282-283 
289 (see liberty) 

the false, 8 

the noble, 8, 21 
French philosophers, 10 
Friendship, 1,4, 15, 15-16, 17, 96 

113. "7. 133. 137. 151. 159. 168 

169, 171, 174, 187, 198, 205, 222 

229, 238-239, 264, 265, 271, 274 

277, 278, 279, 286 (see brother- 
hood, affection) 
Frost-work, 136, 182, 185 
Frothingham, O. B., 27 
Fruits (unspecified), 22, 30, 33 
54, 59, 108, 140 

apple, 30, III, 151 

cherry, 149 

date, 108 

fig, 108 

grape, 12, 58, 187, 276 

peach, 32, 58, 86 

plum, 149 
Future good on earth (see good) 
Future life (see immortal hope) 

Gabriel, 148 

Galilee, 65, 70, 76, 262 

Gauls, 44 

Genius, 5, 16, 23, 24 (see creative 

faculty) 
German metaphysics, 10 
Germany, 239, 256, 264 
Gethsemane, 298-300. 
Gibraltar, 295 



Glory, the modern, 45-46 
God, 7,68, 79, 82,83, 127 

as the Great Mystery, the Un- 
known, 28, 34, 39, 78, 80, 82 
83,85,86,88,89,97,199,281 
(see Nature) 
as order and beauty, 10, 67, 70 
85, 88, 199-200 (see order, 
beauty) 
as truth, 69, 73, 83 (see trath) 
as love, 72, 81, 88, 91 (see love) 
as glee, 199 (see mirth) 
as an ideal, 6, 79, 84, 133 (see 

ideal, ideals) 
revelation of in Nature, 67, 81 
87, 88, 127, 288 (see revela- 
tion) 
in man, 7, 9, 20, 29, 32, 34, 68 
71,72,73,81,82,83, 85, 86 
89, 90, 100, III, 200 (see 
man) 
varying thought concerning, 74 

83, 281 
persecution in the name of, 76 
best ser\'ice of, 35, 79, 82, 83 

85, 88 
co-operation with, 82, 88, 100 
Gods, the, 5, 7, 10, 28, 29, 35, 40 
41, 58, 79.80, 89, 175, 229 
as ideals, 41 (see ideal, ideals) 
Godlike, the, in the human, 7, 9 
20, 29, 32, 41, 70, 71, 85, 90 
(see God in man) 
Gold standard, 18, 20, 61 
Golden Age, 22, 23, 24, 65, 75 
109, 135, 266 (see good on 
earth) 
Golden fleece, 9, 121 
Golden mean, 282 
Good, search for, 5, 7, 11, 13, 31 

32,223ff 

Good on earth, the growmg, 7, 8 
13,22,23,24,25, 26, 29,31, 32 

34> 35' 36. 37. 38-39. 40. 41. 42 
45-46, 46-47, 50, 51-52, 53, 54 
54-55. 55' 56. 57' 59. 60, 62, 04 
65-66, 71, 73, 74, 75,77,79.81 
84, IOC, 109, 112, 128, 134-135 
175, 266, 284, 288 



320 



GENERAL INDEX 



Good will to men, i, 4, 7, 13, 14 
21, 25, 26, 3s^ 37,39,41,74,88 
loo-ioi, 102, 109, 1 13, 141, 144 

146, 243, 257, 260, 262, 263, 266 

271 (see brotherhood, love) 
Good universe, 21, 31, 34, 85, 28S 
Gospel, the New, 65, 77, 79 
Goths and Vandals, 141 
Grain, i, 33, 46, 54, 58, 59, 68 

99, 170, 171, 176 
Grass (see flowers) 
Great ones, neglect of, 29, 63 
Greatness, the true, 6, 7, 45-46 

51, 56, 60-61, 63, 77, 115, 141 

243-244, 245-248 
Greece, 5, 7, 8, 9, 219; language 

of, 10, II ; religion of, 87 
Greed, 20, 33, 57, 75, 100, 135 
283 (see avarice) 

national, 283 
Gulf of Mexico, 23 
Gull, 119, 121, 158, 173, 174 

Hancock Hill, 183, 192 

Happiness (see serenity) 

Happy daily work, 130-131 

Happy man, the, 1 08-1 10, 126 
245-248, 250 

Harbors, bays, 87, 97, 120, 166 
174,175,184,230,241,252,281 
295 (see ocean, ships, beach) 

Hardness, life's, 5, 13, 20, 23, 31 
40,47,48, 50, 97, 121-122, 129 
13O' 132-133' 135' 185 (see se- 
renity, life. Nature's destruct- 
ive forces) 

Hate, 7, 75, 225 

Health, 22, 25, 59, 88, 108, 126 
264, 274 (see disease) 

Heaven, overruling power, 5, 129 
162 (see fate) 
abode of the blest, 21, 68, 73 
84, 89, 102, 136, 176, 196, 239 
266 
ideal good, 73, 78, 84, 96, 139 
169, 192 (see ideal) 

Hebrew inscription, 298 

Helicon, 94, 254 

Hell, 9, 35, 68, 81, 136, 139 



Helpers, the, 16, 37, 39, 45, 48, 51 
54, 56, 60, 63, 70, 83, 100, 128 

Henley (quoted), 138 

Herculaneum, 220 

Heredity, 37-38, 38-39, 59, 62-63 
129, 138-139, 144, 249 

Hermes, 175 

Hero-worship, 44-45, 46-47, 245 

Hesperides, 151, 152 

Higginson, Thomas W., 27 

Hilltops, I, 4, 13, 14, 25, 56, 107 
123, 129, 133, 167, 168, 169, 170 
172, 178, 179, 181-192, 203, 227 
231, 272-273, 287, 305 (see 
mountains) 

Holmes, O. W., 110-112 

Holy ground, 14, 75, 83 

Homer, 5, 125, 161 

Honors, 5, 6, 16, 46-47, 54, 99 
146, 261, 277, 290 (see fame) 

Hope, 7, 15, 34, 68, 73, 75' 77, 96 
100, 139 (see trust) 

Horeb, 14 

Howe, Julia Ward, 27 

Human progress, 1-306 (see life, 
man, good on earth, progress) 

Humanitarianism (see good will) 

Humboldt, 45 

Ideal Beauty, 105, 133, 289 
Ideal man, the, 25, 34, 41 
Ideal, Man's New, 126 
Ideal, Moral (see moral ideal) 
Ideals, 25, 112, 131, 132 (see 

aspiration, heaven iii) 
Ignorance, 5, 21, 30, 32, 55, 66, 75 

79' 87, 135 
Illinois, 169, 271, 278 
Imagination, 43, 108, 132, 140 

150, 197, 279, 292 
Immortal hope, the, 66, 77, 81 

102, 103, 127, 162, 193-206, 264 

278, 289, 298 (see otherworldli- 

ness, heaven ii) 
Immortality, earthly, 37-38, 38- 

39, 45, 128 (see influence) 
Impulse, evil, 5, 60, 129, 130, 132 

135' 136, 142-143' 143, 231-234 
(see temptation, self-control) 



GENERAL INDEX 



321 



India, 9, 62, 63, 96, 108, 243 

Indian Camp Pool, 189 

Indian summer, 181 

Indian tribes, 58, 158, 159 «, 189 

Individualism, the baneful, 20, 21 

Individuality, sacredness of, 15 
86, 92, 96 (see self) 

Influence, permanence of, 37-38 
46, 58-60, 61, 62-63, 99' i°3 
135, 242-244, 276, 286, 288, 290 
306 (see good on earth ; pos- 
terity; immortality, earthly) 

Initiative (see creative faculty) 

Innocence, 91, 144 

Insects, 10, 184 

bee, 19, 144, 152, 165, 183 
beetle, 13 
butterfly, 154 
cricket, 19 
dragon-fly, 153, 272 
firefly, 155 

Inspiration, insight, 2, 8,9, 13, 15 
132, 199 (see genius) 

Integrity, 8, 18 (see right) 

Intemperance, 116 

Intensive farming, 23, 30 (see 
agriculture) 

Internationalism, 21, 24, 26, 32 
33' 54, 75' 109, 289 

Invention (see creative faculty) 

Ionia, 161 

Isaac, 298-300 

Isaiah, 45 

Italy, 201, 207 ff, 264, 268 

James, Prof. William, 10 

Janes, Dr. Lewis G., 288-290 

Japan, 250 

Jerusalem, 300 

Jesus, II, 45, 65-66, 70, 73, 76 

86, 115, 126, 143, 175, 224, 262 

299-301 
Jews, 87, 123-124, 211, 298-301 
Job, Book of, quoted in title, 89 
Jones, Jenkin Lloyd, 27 
Joseph of Arimathea, 77 
Joseph of Nazareth, 299 
Jove, 28 
Judas, 300 



July, 272 

June, 22, 28, 35, 177, 187 

Justice, 5, 7, 13, 25, 35, 48, 102 

Keats, quoted in title, 262 
Kitch-a-makin hill, 182, 186 
Knowledge, 4, 8, 19, 21, 24, 25, 67 
76, 77, 83,91,148, 223, 278 (see 
wisdom, philosophy, science) 

Labor, ^2' 47-48> 49-50, 106, 156 
196 (see work, toil, leisure) 

Laughter, 50, 109, no, 157, 164 
266, 274 (see mirth) 

Law, civil, disregard of, 20 

Law, Natural, 29-32, 34, 66-68 
88, 144 (see life) 

Lazarus, 166 

Lear, 221 

Learning, 4, 16, 19 (see wisdom, 
knowledge) 

Leisure, 34, 50 (see recreation) 

Lethe, 106 

Liberty, 50, 53, 54, 282 (see free- 
dom) 

Liberty not license, 8 

Liberty of thought, 74 

" Life, The Complete," dedication 
of, 278 

Life, delight in, 13, 21, 31, 42, 50 
66-68, 107-110, 112, 146, 149 
165-192, 286, 289 (see serenity) 

Life, the good, 5, 6, 7, 11, 31, 32 
34, 37-46, 85, 135, 271 

Life, the law of, 6, 13, 25, 26, 29 
32, 34, 96, 103 

Life, the mingled beauty, tragedy, 
mystery, and opportunity of, 
5-9, 10, 13-15, 20-26, 28-36 
39-40,41,42,47, 62, 72, 81,85 
90, 93' 95' 96' 97' 98-101, 103 
105, 118, 120-122, 129, 130, 134 
136-148, 149-192, 199-200, 260 
284, 289 (see hardness. Nature) 

Life, the simple, 11, 18, 34, 54, 66 
107-110, 114-115, 126-127, 130 
139, 140, 146, 178, 184 

Life, the Way of, 5, 7, 25-26, 29 
31, 41, 42, 84, 87, 134, 231 



322 



GENERAL INDEX 



Lighthouses, 87, 107 
Lightning, 6, 29, 30, 112, 172, 215 

Living, the art of, 93-148 (1-306) 
Loss and change, 96, 97, 130, 195 

197-198, 201-202, 204-206 
Love, affection, i, 62, 70, 72, 113 
127, 130, 197-198, 201, 237 
241, 257 (see friendship ; see 
affection) 
good will to men, 1,7, 24, 39 
40, 41, 46, 54, 56, 58, 70, 72 
75, 81, 82, 83, 87, 102, 113 
115, 122, 127, 135, 225, 257 
289 (see good on earth, good 
will to men, brotherhood) 
of the ideal, 7, 40, 81, 87, 104 
122, 135 (see moral ideal; 
beauty, ideal ; aspiration) 
Lowell, James Russell, 7, 45, 56 
Luxury, 6, 18, 23^ 54 (see wealth) 

Macbeth, 14 
Macedonia, 43, 299 
Man, chief end of, 32 

dignity of, 20, 25 28, 29, 34, 41 
48, 50, 54, 59, 74, 82, 89, 90 

91. 131 
evolution of, 5, 7, 20, 24-26, 28 

29' 31. 34. 40, 42,47. 50, 54 
58, 61, 66, 67, 93, 128, 131 
134, 271 (see progress, life) 

the ideal, 21, 34, 41, 131 
Man his own saviour, 32, 34, 35 

41, 48, 50, 74, 87, 100, 112, 128 

129, 131 
Man's right to the earth (see 

earth's resources) 
Manliness, 21, 37, 99, 104 
Manila, 24 (see Philippines) 
March, 119 

Marriage, 37, 241, 250, 268 
Mars, war-god, 299 
Martyrs, 29, 56-57, 63, 96, 134 

(see prophets, saviours, saints) 
Materialism, 8, 18, 56, 273 
Matter vs. soul, 79 
May, 27, 32, 182 (see spring) 
Mead, Edwin D., 27 



Meadows, 127, 136, 154, 157, 168 

292 (see fields) 
Meditation, 9, 18, 132, 148, 185 

298 (see memories) 
Memories, 15, 15-16, 140, 173 

254-256, 269-270, 271, 276, 278 

291-294 
Mental science, 34, 85, 90, 96 

156-157 
Metaphysics, 10, 11, 32, 89, 126 

(see philosophy, dreams ii ) 
Meteors, 305-306 
Michael (angel), 148 
Michaelangelo, 207 
Middle ground, the, 2S2 
Middlesex Fells, 14, 227-234 
Milton, John, 7 
Ministers of truth and good, 14 

16, 223, 290 
Miracle, 22, 34, 66-68, 123-124 
(see signs and symbols) 

as symbol : Moses' rod, 73, 123 
Mirth, rapture, 13, 21, 22, 107- 
1 10 (see life, delight in; se- 
renity ; laughter) 

frivolity, 42, 47 (see social) 
Moderation, wise, 235-236 

time-serving, 282 
Mohammed, 86, 161 
Monadnock, 126, 185, 235, 272 

287 
Money, invitation to lose a little, 

19-20 
Moon, 201, 206, 251-253, 293 
Moonlight, 127, 251-253 
Moral ideal, 9, 25, 26, 41, 74, 78 

80, 81, 82, 83, 86, 104, 105, 133 

135 (see aspiration, ought) 
Moral law, origin of, 81, 82, 83, 86 
Morning, 13, 53, 66, 92, 97, 107 

131, 133, 176, 198 (see sunrise) 
Moses, 14, 73, 123, 126, 228 
Mother Nature, 22-24, 55. 86, 100 

155, 176, 255; the solveless 

Mother, 288 (see Nature) 
Mother's breast, 23 
Mothers, 22, 23, 23^ 46, 55, 59, 164 

198, 208-209, 267, 276 
Mott, Lucretia, 27 



GENERAL INDEX 



323 



Mountains (unspecified) 16, 22 
75' 103. 105, 106, 131, 132 
157, 217, 220, 272, 285, 287 
(see hilltops) 

Adirondacks, 170 

Alps, 4, 25, 44, 218, 254 

Apennines, 218 

Caucasus, 7, 142, 229 

Helicon, 94, 254 

Himalayas, 9 

Juras, 218 

Monadnock, 126, 185, 235, 272 
287 

Nebo, 228 

Olivet, 298 

Parnassus, 8 

Rockies, 274 

Sierras, 197 

Sinai, 29 

Vesuvius, 201, 220 
Mount Auburn cemetery, 228 
Muses, 2, 7, 8, 172, 250, 258 (see 

poets and poesy) 
Music, 107, 163, 208-210, 211 
213-214, 239, 240, 277 

Apollo's pipe, 8 

bells, 51, 136, 210-226, 240 

cymbals, 299 

drum, 246 

fife, 299 

flute, 211, 299 

harp, lyre, 2, 8, 211, 298 

lute, 127, 299 

sackbut, 299 

timbrel, 211, 299 

trumpet, 104, 240 

vina, 62 

violin, 211 
Mystery, 7, 10, 11, 34, 39, 42, 80 

89, 235-236, 278 (see God) 
Mystic lakes, 14, 158, 159 note 
Mystic river, 123-124, 157-159 

227, 228, 252, 253, 305 
Mysticism, 9 

Napoleon, 44 

National honor, 6, 24, 137, 282 f 

Nature, beauty and bounty of, i 

5,10,14,18-19,21-24,30,33 



Nature, etc. {continued) 

34, 41, 55, 66-68, 70, 77, 80- 
81,86,88,89,93-95,95,98- 
loi, 107, 109, 125, 164, 166 
167, 169, 171-175, 178-180 
184-192, 199, 203, 266, 288 
291-294 
destructive forces in, 5, 28-31 
39-40, 54, 57, 60, 89, 142, 144 
secrecy of, 5, 10, 28, 42, 79, 86 

193; solveless Mother, 288 
conquest of, by man, 29, 30-31 
36,37,40,41, 42, 50, 54, 54- 
55' 57. 67, 9I' 100, 106 
confidence in, 80-81, 203 

Nature at play, 170, 266 

Nature, Mother (see mother) 

Nature's resources, right of all 
men to (see earth's resources) 

Nazareth, 262 

Nemesis, 141 

Neptune, 154 

New England, 6, 24, 176 ; poets, 6 

New ideal, new philosophy, 126 

Night, II, 94, 97, 168, 206, 264 
272, 293, 305-306 

Nirvana, 184 

No-Man's-Land, 280 

" No Trespass," 22 

Novelists, 61, 108 

November, 1S2, 297 

Nut and fruit diet, 108 

Obedience to the highest, 32 

Ocean, 1, 34, 50, 92, 93, 98, 102 
119,120-122,153,156, 157, 158 
168,172,174, 175,186,230,235 
264, 274, 280-281, 286, 295-297 
(see ships, sailors, sea, etc.) 

October, 155, 181, 185, 187, 274 

Old age, youthful, 90, no, 140 
146, 147, 179, 235, 274 

Old year, 265, 284 

Omar Khayyam, 169 

Opportunity, 93-95, 95, 113, 284 

Order in Nature, 10, 98, 180, 199 
203 (see Nature) 

Orpheus, 214 

Otherworldliness, 84, 89, 128, 281 



324 



GENERAL INDEX 



Ought, the, 56, 61, 288 (see moral 

ideal) 
Overcoming, 129, 132, 13S, 144 

Pacific ocean, 50 

Paganism, 7, 1 1 

Pain, 5, 7, 31, 32, 40, 46, 59, 80 

85, 90, 97, 102, 103, 106, 122 

130, 134-135- 164 
Palestine, 66, 219 
Pan, 163-164, 172 
Paphos, 172 
Paradise, 92, 103, 152, 214, 216 

223, 303 (see Eden) 
Parnassus, 8 

Parsees, sun-worship, 62, 168 
Parthenon, 220 

Past, the, 8, 12, 13, 15, 18, 35, 52 
60, 62, 66, 76, 145, 224 

debt to the, 52, 54, 65, 289 
Path of life (see life) 
Patience, 25, 137, 212, 223 
Patmos, 252 

Patriotism, 6, 24, 137, 282-283 
Patterson, A. J., 290 
Peace, 25, 32-33, 45, 51, 59, 100 

(see war) 
Pearson, Col. D. C, 279 
Persia, 45, 62 
Peter the great, 44 
Petrarch, 207 
Pharaoh, 124 
Phi Beta Kappa, 3, 25 
Philip of Macedon, 64, 299 
Philippines, 24, 282-2S3, 289 
Philosophy, 3, 10, 11, 21, 26, 225 
246 (see wisdom) 

the New, 126 (see metaphysics) 
Ph.D., 16 

Phoebus Apollo, 168, 234 
Physics, 246 
Pierian spring, 19 
Pilate, 224 

Pilgrim, Bunyan's, 161, 188 
Pindar, 5 
Plato, 171 
Poesy, the conditions of high, 6 

7-8, 8, 61 (see song) 
Poetic form, sound vs. sense, 6, 61 



Poets and poesy, i, 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 28 
38, 45, 51, 56, 61, 100, 106, 108 
1 10, 192, 250, 277 (see prophets, 
seers, song) 

Poles, earth's, i, 30, 127, 168 

Pompey, 44, 141 

Posterity, 37, 54, 55, 60, 62-63, " 28 

Poverty, 23, 33, 34, 41, 47, 53, loi 

"9. 135 
Powder-house, old, 252-253 
Power and place, 6, 18, 102 
Praise and blame, 122, 212, 277 
Prayer, 29, 32, 47, 59, 70, 90, 96 

100, 133, 213, 241, 242 
Preaching, 113, 125-126, 241, 271 
Pre-existence, 260 
Present, the, 8, 12, 13, 52, 60, 68 

76,85 
Priests, 14, 84, 168, 179, 299 
Progress, 8, 13, 18, 20, 23-26, 28 
29, 31,40,42, 51, 53-55, 58 
66,67,71,79, 81, 85, 87, 98- 
99. 103, 107, 112, 128, 134 
(seegood on earth) 

through defeat, 64, 91 

eternal, 70, 85, 107 
Prometheus, 7, 8, 61, 142, 229 
Prophets, 7, 16, 23, 29, 51,63, 71 

139,263,280-281 (see saviours) 
Punch and Judy, 1 1 1 
Purgatory, 68, 136 
Pythagoras, 45 

Rain, 98, 117, 168, 171, 253, 255 

287, 297 
Rainbow, 30, 72 
Raphael, 136 
Recreation, 5, 34, 50, 108, 158 

264 (see leisure) 
Red sea, 123-124 
Reform, opposition to, 7, 29, 32 
54, 56-57, 76, 143, 282 

the noble and the needless, 289 
Religion, as a life, 70-71, 88 

Free, 74, 86, 87, 88 

reason in, 84, 224, 225 
Revelation, 31, 67, 71, y2< 79, 83 

85, 86, 87, 91, loi, 226, 281, 288 
Revere, Paul, 227, 253 



GENERAL INDEX 



325 



Right, the, 6, 8, 9, 14, 24, 25, 22^ 35 

44, 48, 75, 282, 283 (see wrong) 
Rivers, 46, 58, 146, 204, 278 (see 
brooks, streams) 

Allegheny, 58 

Amazon, 158, 256 

Charles, 172, 228 

Concord, 291-294 

Danube, 62, 218, 256 

Euphrates, 159, 255 

Fox, 271, 278 

Gihon, 159, 255 

Jordan, 262 

Mississippi, 58 

Mystic, 123-124, 157-159, 227 
228, 252\ 253, 305 

Niger, 62 

Nile, 45, 62 

Rhine, 218, 238, 256 

Shannon, 221 

Styx, 204 

Volga, 62 

Yellowstone, 58 
Robbins, Wentworth B., 285-287 
Rome, 136, 141, 215, 221 
Royce, Prof. Josiah, 10 
Russia, 44, 283 

Sailors, 14, 87, 186, 196, 280-281 
297 (see ships, shore, ocean) 

Saints, 45, 56, 96, 109, no (see 
prophets, saviours) 

Sanborn, Frank, 27 

Sassamon Notch, 182, 186 

Saturnalia, 109 

Saviour, man his own (see man) 

Saviours, 7, 29, 31, 45, 51, 54, 56 
60, 63, 74, 83, 86, 87 (see mar- 
tyrs, saints, prophets) 

Science and scientists, 4, 8, 9, 10 
II, 21, 25-26, 45,67, 100, 142 
(see philosophy) 

Sculpture, 9, 45, 130, 141, 208 
(see art, music) 

Sea, 53, 67, 74, 87, 97, 98, 106, 1 10 
113,123-124,127,154,157,158 
165, 186, 196, 199, 203, 227, 228 
251, 272-273, 286, 290, 295-297 
(see ocean, ships, beach, waves) 



Sea-bathing, 50, 175, 259 

Seers, 7, 45, 48, 76, 79, 133, 289 

(see poets, prophets) 
Self, the, 74, 78, 86, 90, 92, 96, 102 

103, 136, 139 (see individuality) 
Self-control, 25, 37, 102, 104, 129 

139 (see temptation) 
Self -forgiveness, 137 
Self-sufficiency, 28-29, 74' 9°' 9^ 

103, 116, 12?, 131 
Selfishness, self-seeking, 6, 20-22 

25> 34, 41. 44> 46-47. 53, 56, 60 
61, 88, loi, 106, 109, 141, 266 
282 (see avarice, greed) 

Selflessness, self-sacrifice, 7, 8, 45 
46, 54, 56, 61, 70-71, 79, 86, 141 

Seneca, 45 

Seneca Indians, 58 

Sense and soul, 104, no, 139 

September, 176, 285 

Serenity, 31, 84, 85,90,97, 98, 103 
106, 1 08- 1 10, 119, 122, 126, 127 
129,130, 131,132,136, 137,146 
159, 167, 185, 203, 245-248, 261 
273 (see cheerfulness ; life, de- 
light in ; mirth i ) 

Shakespeare, 45, 161, 171 (quoted 
in title, 92) 

" Shanty, the," 188 

Shells, 184 (see beach) 

Shiloh, 299 

Ships, 18, 87, 92, 97, 102, 120-121 
173, 186, 228, 240-241, 252, 264 
280-281 , 295-297, 297 (see light- 
houses, sailors, ocean, sea) 

Shore, 53, 87, 92,93, 102, no, 119 
121,153,172,173, 174, 186,230 
264, 281 (see ocean, harbors) 

Sicily, 296 

Signs and symbols, 73, 74, 84 (see 
miracle) 

Simmons, Henry M., 135 

Simonides, 6 

Simple life (see life, the simple) 

"Sin," 41, 46, 125, 143, 144, 172 
266 

Sinai, 29 

Sirens, 293 

Sisyphus, toil of, 7 



326 



GENERAL INDEX 



Sky, I, 22, 25, 67, 71, 72, 89, 91, 94 
107, no, 119, 120, 127, 131, 154 
156, 170, 173, 179, 186, 196, 203 
215, 229, 241, 251, 278, 280, 287 
290 (see clouds) 

Sleep, 1 1-12,88, 107, 174, 194, 242 

Sleet, 49, 132, 165, 287 (see snow) 

Snow, 10, 136, 160, 182, 185, 186 
187, 188, 189, 192, 264, 304 (see 
sleet, rain) 

Social frivolity, 6, 42, 46-47, 50 
loo-ioi, 109, 126, 132, 140-141 
157,250, 28l_ 

Social reorganization, 20-22, 24 
26, 29, 33, 35, 42, 47-50, 53-57 
75, 88, 100, 109, 126, 128, 146 
266 (see justice ; earth's re- 
sources, right of all men to) 

Socialism, 20, 21, 50, 53 (see 
brotherhood) 

Socialist, the, 21 

Socrates, 45 (quoted, 80) 

Solomon, 299, 300 

Song, I, 2,6, 7-8, 12, 15, 22, 59, 75 
90, 106, 108, 113, 127,130, 133 
136, 137, 163, 177, 192, 239, 240 
250, 258, 266, 275, 277 (see 
poets and poesy ; bird-songs) 

Sophocles, 5 

Soul, I, 5, 7, 8, 15, 18, 21, 28, 30 
33' 34, 45' SO, 59,68,69,70,71 
74, 75, 78-79, 84, 88, 96, 103 
105, no, 116, 122, 126, 130, 131 

^ 134,156-157,174, 179, 273 
Soul dulled by drudgery, 33-34 

47-48, 49-50, 126,130-131,156 
Spain, 254 
Speculation, theological, 89 (see 

metaphysics) 
Speech, the beginning of, 20 
Spencer, Herbert, 10, 45 
Spirit, spiritual life, 6, 12, 21, 52 

131, 179, 236, 273, 281 (see 

soul, eternal life) 
Spiritism, 159 note 
Spring, 2, 10, 68, 115, 160, 169 

174, 177, 180, 182, 187, 236, 266 

271, 278, 293 (see April, May, 

June) 



Springs, fountains, 94-95, 185 
Squirrels, 125, 152, 173, 184, 228 
Star, the, as a symbol, 26, 76-77 
Stars, 13, 19, 20, 23, 36, 38, 42, 56 
67, 70, 71, 72, 76,87, 89, 94 
95, 104, 107, 112, 133, 154 
168, 194, 196-197, 200, 201 
206, 251, 262-263, 276, 285 
288, 290, 305 (see earth, sun, 
moon, meteors) 
Arcturus, 189 
Mars, 201, 293 
Orion, 19 
Venus, 189, 293 
State, the, 5, 20, 114, 282 
Stone Age, 59 

Storm, 12, 57, 85, 97, 121, 132- 
133, 158, 165, 182, 186, 215 

254, 304 
Stradivarius, 211 
Streams, 14, 87, 107, 124, 127, 132 

136, 146, 236, 285, 298 (see 

brooks, rivers) 
Success, 8, 119, 122, 126-127 
Summer, lo, 68, 125, 155, 180 

187, 215, 227, 272, 278, 287 
Sumner, Charles, 228 
Sun, 13, 22, 62, 116, 156, 168, 171 

I73,.i75'i77, 178, 187,283,290 
Sunshine, i, 12, 70, 75, 97, in 

112, 160, 166, 183, 185, 231, 287 
Sunrise, 9, 10, 13, 53, 59, 62, 66 

97,107, 117, 120, 127, 132, 133 

166-167, 168, 170-171, 172, 175 

179, 180, 206, 235, 264, 287 (see 

morning) 
Sunset, 13, 123, 127, 167, 168, 172 

204, 228, 242, 251, 290, 299 (see 

twilight) 
Sun-worship, 62, 168 
Sunda islands, 295 
Superstitions, 9, 28, 74, 145 
Switzerland, 264 
Sympathy, 8, 24, 42, 244 
Syria, 12, 45, 96, 175, 264, 298 

Temple, Edward F., 16, 205 
Temptation, 37, 142, 144 (see 
self-control) 



GENERAL INDEX 



327 



Tennyson, 7 

Texas, 23 

Theatre, 109, 178 

Theology, speculation, 89 (see 

metaphysics) 
Theseus (allusion to), 7 
Thought, 4, 15, 20, 40, 50, 63, 67 

102, 106, 108-109, 174 
Thunder, 29, 165, 215 (see light- 
ning) 
Tieck (quoted), 160 
Titan, 104, 186 
" Titles," 99 (see fame) 
Titus, 300 

" Together," 20 (see brotherhood) 

Toil, 24, 88, 106, 108, 122, 130 

147, 156-157, 161, 172, 174 

185 (see work, labor) 
Trade, 18, 19, 41, 46, 106, 252 
Tradition, 9, 12, 15, 74, 85, 224 

(see creeds, dogmas) 
Tragedy, life's, 6, 7 (see life) 
Traitor, a loyal, 282 
Travel, 264 

Trees, 13, 19, 40, 49, 115, 149 
163-164, 165, 167, 177, 279 
293 (see woods) 

apple, 151 

alder, 185 

beech, 231 

birch, 176, 187, 189, 228, 231 

Bodhi-tree, 167 

calabash, 255 

chestnut, 125, 183 

cypress, 119, 129 

elder, 160 

elm, 151, 154, 160, 167, 169 

fir, 168 

hazel, 182, 228, 231 

hemlock, 14, 172, 173, 176, 177 
191, 230, 234, 304 

larch, 158, 172, 206, 234 

mango, 283 

maple, 132, 149, 151, 155, 163 
169, 174, 185, 231, 236, 255 

mountain-ash, 255 

oak, 125, 163, 166, 171, 185 
215, 228 

olive, 298-300 



Trees [contitiued) 

palm, 119, 138, 143, 192, 281 
pine, 14, 68, 80-81, 138, 152 
154, 176, 180, 184, 185, 186 
190, 192, 199, 284, 304 
spruce, 10, 152, 180, 279 
sumach, 156, 176, 183, 231 
sycamore, 213 
willow, 158 
witch-hazel, 182 
Treetop land, 149, 279 
Tropics, 49, 92, 217, 296 
Trust, 84, 85, 87, 88, 91, 97, 137 
I S3 (see faith, hope, serenity) 
Truth, 7, 9, 12, 13, 25, 42, 50, 51 
66, 69, 73, 74,76,83,84,118 
127, 223, 290 
faithfulness to, 7, 9, 42, 66, 69 

84, 91,92, 117-118, 223, 290 
letter vs. spirit of, 12 
neglected, vs. lofty lies, 9 
search for, 5,9,9-13, 14, 15, 29 
42, 84, 92, 127, 223 ff, 280- 
281, 290 
vs. tradition, 15 (see tradition) 
Tufts College, 3, 14, 17, 120 
159 note, 205 note, 207, 227- 
228, 251, 254, 285 note; Prof. 
Dolbear, 10; The Old -Time 
Boys, 15 
Turkish massacres, 57 
Twilight, ic, 19, 25, 56, 140, 185 

259 (see sunset) 
Tyrian dyes, 299 

Unity (Chicago), 280-281 
Universe, the, good (see good 

universe) 
Unselfishness (see selflessness) 

Vespucci, 14 

Vestal virgin, 63 

Vesuvius, 201, 220 

Victory in defeat, 46, 64, 118- 

119, 135, 138-139, 145 (see 

defeat in victory) 
Vineyard Haven, Mass., 153 
Vineyards, 58, 67, 239, 264 
Virgil, 161 



328 



GENERAL INDEX 



Virtue, i8, 24, 25, 54, 60, 104 
144 (see integrity; see right) 

Voluptuousness, the rational, 107 
(see life, the simple) 

Vulcan, 168 

Vulture, 7, 44, 142, 230 

Walking, 3, 14, 15, 17, 18, 22-25 

278 
War, 25, 32-33, 43-46, 46-47, 53 

55. 57, 61, 75' 99, 139,141,146 

215-216,257, 266, 268, 283, 299 

(see peace) 
War and literature, 5 
Washington, George, 253 
Waves, "67, 93, 95, 97, 119, 157 

158, 174, 178, 184, 196, 264, 280 

286, 296 (see ocean, sea, ships, 

harbors, lighthouses, beach) 
Way of life (see life) 
Wealth, riches, luxury, 18, 20, 102 
I ID, 249-250 (see riches, lux- 
ury) 

niggard, miserly, loi, 137, 177 
249-250 (see avarice) 

of the simple life, 18, 127, 178 
245, 261 (see life, the simple) 
Wedgwood, 108 

West, the (United States), i, 169 
West Hall, Tufts College, 17 
Western Europe, 44, 220 
Western logic, 1 1 
Whip-poor-will, 19, 252 (see 

birds) 
Whitman, Walt, 7 
Wildcat Notch, 80, 184 
Will-lessness, 60, 138, 142-143 

232-234 
Will-power, 13, 31, 32, 37-38, 41 

44, 50, 55, 78,81,87,91,95,99 

129,131,132,133, 135, 137, 138 

139, 147, 273 



Wind, 18, 57, 67, 119, 165, 174 

182, 186, 187, 188, 232, 233, 251 

279, 280, 286, 297 (see breeze) 
Winter, 10, 49, 129, 132, 136, 160 

173, 174, 177, 180, 185, 186, 189 

278, 304 
Wisdom, 8, 25 (4-26), 29, 39, 50 

53, 86, 91, 102, 224, 225, 289 

(see knowledge) 
Wise, Isaac M., 27 
Wit, no, 116 
Woman, 23, ;^^, 34, 46 (see 

mothers) 
Woods, 14, 18, 58, 107, 123, 125 

129,155,156,163,166, 171,175 

184, 278, 279, 304 ; in autumn, 

155, 181 (see trees) 
Wordsworth, 7 
Work, 33, 106, 108, 130, 140, 150 

171, 274-275 (see labor, toil) 
Work or starve, 33, 88 
Work as play, 19, 66, 130-131 
World-helpers (see helpers) 
Worship, 29, 62, 78, 80, 83, 84, 85 

88, 105, 125-126, 179, 224 
Worth makes the man, 18 
Wrong, 6, 25, 47, 50, 51, 54, 58, 60 

75, 266, 282 (see right) 

Yahweh, 28 

Year, old (see old year) 

Youth, 4, 14, 15, 17, 104, 127, 142 
145, 146, 147, 158, 175, 179 
227-234, 237, 256-257, 268, 284 

Youthful old age (see age) 

Zeal, 32, 93-95, 95, 122, 131, 147 
(see earnestness, will, devotion) 

Zetagathean Society, 207, 223 

Zoroaster, 45; fire-worship, 62 
168 

" Zuversicht " (quoted), 160 



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